Chapter 12: The Fall of the Prodigal
In March 2028, the federal hammer finally dropped on Julian Vale.
Following the forensic evidence submitted by Claire’s oversight team, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois unsealed a fourteen-count criminal indictment against Julian, charging him with wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, and tax evasion.
The Chicago media covered the arrest extensively.
News broadcasts showed Julian being led in handcuffs from his rented apartment in River North, his head bowed, his face shielded from the flashing cameras by an old winter coat.
He faced a mandatory minimum sentence of seven to ten years in federal prison, along with $3.2 million in mandatory restitution.
Claire watched the thirty-second news clip on the monitor in her Michigan Avenue office.
She felt no vindictive joy, no triumphant malice. She felt only the quiet, sober closure of a woman who had watched the natural, inescapable law of harvest take its course: *what a man sows in arrogance, he reaps in shame.*
May you like
She closed the news window, picked up her fountain pen, and returned to reviewing the annual scholarship applications for the *Maya Nolan Endowment for Women in Mathematics*.
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