Snatched a Billionaire to Be My Husband — Episode 26
The handcuffs felt colder than the engagement ring beside them. Cora stood in Evelyn’s garden while federal agents recited rights she understood only in fragments. One hour earlier, she had been discussing flowers and vows. Now she was accused of stealing ninety million dollars from the company her father died trying to save. Guests watched from beneath the wedding lights, too shocked even to whisper.
Byron moved between her and the lead agent. “Remove those cuffs.” His voice carried the authority that usually moved boardrooms, but the agent did not blink. “Interfering with a federal arrest will not help Ms. Lane.”
“Neither will treating a pregnant woman like a flight risk.” Byron’s fury sharpened. Cora caught his hand before he could turn protection into obstruction. “Call the lawyers,” she said. “Find out how they created my signature.”
The calm in her own voice surprised her. Malcolm had designed the arrest to make her panic, run, or beg Byron to overpower the system. She would do none of those things. If her name appeared on the transfer, she would force the evidence to explain exactly how it got there.
Evelyn tried to rise from her wheelchair, but a nurse steadied her. “My daughter had nothing to do with the accounts,” she insisted. The agents documented the statement without changing course. Cora kissed her mother’s cheek and promised she would return before the garden flowers faded.
Byron rode behind the federal vehicle with attorneys already joining by phone. Through the rear window, Cora saw his car remain close at every intersection. Even separated by steel and procedure, he refused to let her disappear into the system completely alone.
At the federal building, investigators placed screenshots from the backup drive across an interview table. The disputed transfer had been approved with Cora’s private digital certificate, a biometric confirmation, and an encrypted token registered to her personal laptop. Each technical layer appeared designed to eliminate the possibility of impersonation, which was precisely why the frame looked convincing.
“I never authorized it,” she said. The prosecutor asked whether anyone else used the computer. Cora remembered Easton borrowing it during their engagement, assistants handling travel bookings, and her father occasionally reviewing documents beside her. Years of ordinary trust had created countless openings.
Her attorney stopped the interview when questions shifted toward Byron. Investigators suggested that his private trust benefited from Lane Capital’s collapse, ignoring the documents showing he had purchased debt to prevent liquidation. The accusation revealed that Malcolm’s frame extended beyond Cora.
“They want one of us to blame the other,” she told Byron during a monitored call. He stood behind the glass, his face controlled and his eyes furious. “Then they will be disappointed.”
He promised to secure her release before nightfall. Cora reminded him that federal bail depended on a judge, not his wealth. “Everything depends on someone,” Byron said. “My task is finding the person who can be persuaded by facts.”
Pregnancy made detention more complicated. A nurse examined Cora, confirmed that stress had elevated her blood pressure, and ordered food she could barely swallow. She focused on the heartbeat she had heard at the ultrasound and treated every breath as an act of protection.
The bail hearing was delayed until morning after prosecutors claimed the missing funds made flight possible. Cora spent the night in a private holding room arranged for medical reasons, not luxury. Fluorescent lights remained on, leaving no darkness in which to rest.
She thought of her father enduring accusations alone. Had he sat beneath similar lights, knowing the evidence carried his identity while the crime belonged to someone else? Cora finally understood how a forged signature could become more persuasive than a lifetime of character. The realization replaced some of her fear with anger sharp enough to keep her awake.
At dawn, Byron’s attorneys produced evidence that Cora had not accessed the transfer account before the Lane collapse. The prosecutor countered that the token could authorize transactions without a login. The judge granted bail but imposed electronic monitoring, travel restrictions, and surrender of every device. Cora accepted the conditions rather than allow prosecutors to portray reasonable objection as guilt.
Cora walked out past cameras recording the ankle monitor beneath her dress. Reporters shouted that the pregnancy had earned special treatment. She kept her head high and entered Byron’s waiting car without responding.
Inside, Byron reached for her, then stopped when he saw how rigidly she held herself. Cora crossed the distance and buried her face against him. “I knew I was innocent,” she whispered. “That did not stop me from being afraid.”
“You never have to perform strength for me.” He held her carefully around the monitor wires and the baby between them. The tenderness nearly broke the control she had carried through the night.
Their forensic team traced the digital certificate to an installation made two years earlier, shortly before Cora and Easton announced their engagement. The installer had used a Hansen family network and an administrator profile assigned to Malcolm’s household. The date corresponded to a weekend Cora had spent at the Hansen estate planning the engagement party.
Easton was waiting at the penthouse when they arrived. He looked at the evidence and went pale. “I installed that program,” he confessed. “Dad told me it would combine our finances after the wedding. Cora, I think I gave him the key he used to steal everything.”
