Chapter 2 - The Vanguard Legacy
For four years, Julian believed I was an orphan with a modest trust fund that had run out. That was the story I had told him when we met.
I had wanted a normal life. I grew up suffocated by wealth, surrounded by bodyguards, boarding schools, and people who only wanted my last name. My maiden name was Vanguard. As in Vanguard Holdings. As in the family that owned half the commercial real estate in the city and held the purse strings to the most powerful venture capital firms in the state.
I had hidden it because I wanted Julian to love me, not my portfolio.
When the Maybach pulled through the wrought-iron gates of my family’s sprawling estate, the sheer magnitude of my lie—and Julian’s mistake—settled over me.
My mother, elegantly dressed in a cashmere sweater and pearls, rushed down the stone steps. She didn't say a word. She just wrapped her arms around me, holding me as gently as she could, her tears soaking into my coat.
My father, Richard Vanguard, stood in the doorway. He was a man who commanded boardrooms with a single glance. But right now, looking at his three newborn granddaughters, his eyes were soft.
"You're home, Clara," he said, kissing my forehead.
Later that evening, after a team of private pediatric nurses had settled the girls into a nursery that looked like a royal suite, my father and I sat in his mahogany-paneled study. A fire crackled in the hearth.
"He forced you to sign a property waiver while you were under the influence of heavy painkillers, bleeding in a hospital bed," my father stated, swirling a glass of scotch. "He transferred a marital asset to a mistress to hide it from divorce proceedings."
"He thinks he won, Dad," I said, my voice barely a whisper.
My father set his glass down. The softness in his eyes vanished, replaced by the ruthless billionaire who had crushed empires.
"Julian’s startup, Zenith Tech, just received its Series B funding, did it not?" my father asked.
May you like
"Yes. Five million dollars. He was bragging about the new angel investor before the babies were born."
My father smiled—a cold, terrifying smile. "The angel investor is a shell company. A subsidiary of Vanguard Holdings. Julian works for me, Clara. And by tomorrow morning, he is going to find out what it means to cross this family."
