Chapter 15 - THE OFFICE WHERE THE MARRIAGE BROKE
Federal agents entered Aldercrest Tower with warrants for Celeste and Nolan.
Greer accompanied them only because the patent server required scientific verification before seizure. Rafe remained in his attorney’s office, following through legal updates.
The executive floor looked unchanged. The broken wedding photograph had been removed, but a thin scratch remained where the frame struck the floor.
Greer remembered Rafe at eighteen carrying her chemistry books across a flooded campus path, both of them too young to know affection could acquire habits that later became cages. Nolan and Celeste had chosen this office because they understood symbolic pressure. They wanted every signature to feel like a repetition of the worst moment.
Greer placed both palms on the desk and named five facts aloud: the agents were present, Miriam held the warrant, the orchid was secured, no timer controlled her body, and she could leave.
The room became an office again.
Celeste sat behind Rafe’s former desk. Nolan stood near the tall windows holding the black fountain pen from the divorce papers.
“You left this,” he told Greer.
“It was never yours.”
He claimed the patent transfer was lawful under the hidden marital-dissolution amendment. Because Rafe filed for divorce and Greer remained project director at that moment, Aldercrest automatically received commercialization rights. Celeste could then sell them to Cascadia.
Miriam had anticipated the argument. The amendment was invalid because Nolan’s witnessed signature was procured through page substitution and because no independent counsel represented Greer.
Celeste smiled. “Prove substitution.”
Nolan’s confidence weakened.
Greer realized Celeste intended to abandon him. She had brought him into the office, placed the pen in his hand, and allowed every electronic action to use his credentials.
“She is making you the only thief,” Greer said.
Nolan looked at Celeste. “You said the board would protect us.”
“The board protects the company.”
He began talking.
Nolan described the forged emails, sabotage schedule, toxicity concealment, and hidden tissue shipment. Agents recorded everything. Celeste attempted to leave through the private elevator and was arrested.
The patent transfer stopped at 4:57 p.m.
As officers led Nolan away, he asked Greer whether saving the orchid had been worth losing her marriage.
She looked at the unsigned divorce copy still preserved in an evidence sleeve.
“The orchid did not ask me to destroy my marriage,” she said. “People did. Including me.”
Her phone rang.
May you like
Rafe’s name appeared.
The divorce hearing was scheduled for the next morning.
