With that, Sophia took my hand and, without a backward glance, walked away.
“Wait,” the old woman yelled. “Leave the jewelry. It belongs to the Thorne family.”
I paused, about to unclasp the necklace from my neck, but Sophia’s hand stopped me. She didn’t even turn around. Her back to the crowd, she spoke in a voice of ice.
“This necklace was bought with my mother’s own inheritance money. The receipt is in the safe at home. If you want it, feel free to sue, but I’d advise you to save your energy. You’ll need it to pay for your precious grandson’s therapy.”
She pulled me along, and we walked out of that gilded, nauseating cage under a storm of stunned gazes. Behind us, we could faintly hear the cheers for the cake cutting and Leo’s shrieks of delight. None of it had anything to do with us anymore.
The wind outside was cold, making me shiver. A black Maybach was parked silently by the gate. As we emerged, a chauffeur immediately opened the rear door for us.
“Get in, Mom,” Sophia said.
I was dazed.
“This wasn’t one of the family cars.”
“This is.”
I looked at her, confused. Sophia didn’t explain. She just guided me into the warm interior and got in beside me. The moment the door closed, all the noise was shut out. The car smelled faintly of cedarwood, a calming scent. Sophia leaned back against the seat and let out a long breath. The cold mask on her face softened, revealing a trace of exhaustion, but more than that, a glint of excitement, like a general about to enter a battle.
“Mom, you can cry now,” she said, turning to look at me. “There’s no one else here. Cry it out. We have big things to do.”
Hearing those words, the string I had been holding onto so tightly finally snapped. Tears poured out of me like a broken dam. I covered my face, sobbing like a child in front of my daughter. Fifty million, the divorce, the betrayal, the humiliation—all the grievances of the past years erupted in this small, safe space. Sophia didn’t try to comfort me with words. She just silently handed me tissues and gently patted my back. I don’t know how long I cried. Eventually, my sobs subsided. I wiped my tears and looked at the passing city lights. The ruins of my heart began to cool.
“Sophia, where did this car come from?” I asked, my voice still raw. “And why did you insist on him wiring that $50 million? We don’t need the money.”
Sophia pulled a thick binder from her briefcase and handed it to me. In the dim light of the car’s reading lamp, I saw the title on the cover.
Statement of Ownership and Exclusive Licensing Rights for the Azure Core Algorithm.
And in the beneficiary field, my name was written in bold print.
Elara Vance.
“Mom, we don’t need the money,” Sophia said, her voice sharp and clear in the night, with a metallic edge. “But that $50 million is the last bit of cash Gregory Thorne will ever have.”
I stared at the document, my hands starting to tremble violently.
“What? What is this?”
Every word on the page was familiar, but strung together, they sent a tremor through my very soul. The Azure algorithm. It was the core technology that Nexus Corp depended on for its survival. The reason the company had transformed from a simple electronics manufacturer into a tech giant reaching a $5 billion valuation was entirely due to the line of intelligent industrial robots it had launched three years ago. The brain of those robots was the Azure algorithm. I had always assumed it was developed by an expensive overseas team Nexus had hired.
Sophia looked at me, her eyes burning bright.
“Mom, do you remember five years ago, when I had just started my PhD at MIT? Dad’s company had a cash-flow crisis. He used up all our liquid assets to plug the holes, and he even tried to get his hands on your trust fund.”
I nodded. I remembered Gregory being on edge constantly, coming home angry, throwing things, yelling at me for not understanding, yelling at Sophia for wasting her life in academia instead of helping the family make money.
“Back then, I was in the lab day and night running data, trying to build this model,” Sophia said, tapping the binder. “I wanted to help the family. I wanted him to see us—his wife and daughter—as more than just accessories.”
“Then why…?” I looked at the beneficiary name. Elara Vance.
“Because he had no patience.” Sophia sneered, her eyes full of scorn. “When I sent him the prototype, he didn’t even look at it. He called me a bookworm and said, ‘A bunch of useless code isn’t worth as much as one good dinner with an investor.'”
My heart clenched. I remembered that phone call. Sophia had been silent for a long time on the other end, and then she had just said, “I understand, Mom.”
“Later, when the model was perfected and had immense commercial value, I didn’t tell him.” Sophia’s voice grew quiet. “By then, I already suspected he was cheating. That woman, Melanie, was already showing up on his expense reports. So when I filed for the patent, I put your name on it.”
Sophia squeezed my hand. Her palm was warm and steady.
“Mom, you’re a certified public accountant. You understand the implications? This technology is my personal intellectual property. It has no employment connection to Nexus Corp. I used an independent server, and I have every development log in my possession. I had the right to assign ownership. I gifted it to you. The transfer was notarized three years ago.”
I flipped through the notarized documents. The date was indeed from three years ago. Back then, I was still naively making soup for Gregory, still trying to salvage our crumbling marriage, while my daughter, an ocean away, was forging me the sharpest sword imaginable.
“Every single smart product Nexus Corp has manufactured in the last three years uses this algorithm,” Sophia stated, a shocking fact delivered with perfect calm. “But I never gave Nexus an official commercial license. Before, it was implicitly allowed because I was his daughter and you were his wife. It was a family matter.”
Sophia gestured to the city lights flying past the window, her eyes becoming razor-sharp.
“But that divorce decree severed all ties. That $50 million cut off the last shred of goodwill. The second you signed your name, Mom, Nexus Corp began illegally infringing on your patent.”
My mind raced. My professional instincts as a former top-tier auditor kicked in, and I instantly calculated the consequences. Once the patent license was revoked, Nexus Corp’s production lines would have to halt immediately. All existing inventory would become unsellable scrap metal. Worse, the massive orders they had already signed would be in breach of contract. The penalty fees alone would be enough to bankrupt the company.
“And tomorrow… isn’t tomorrow the Nexus board meeting?” I suddenly remembered. Gregory had mentioned at the party that he planned to announce Melanie’s promotion to the executive team and formalize his son’s place in the family.
Sophia leaned back, a cold smile on her face.
“Tomorrow at 10 a.m., Nexus Corp is holding an all-hands shareholder meeting at their headquarters. It’s going to be livestreamed. Gregory planned to use it as a PR stunt to frame Nexus as a model family business—and incidentally to humiliate us.”
Sophia looked at me.
“That $50 million. Do you know why I had to get it immediately?”
