Clara quickly stood up, holding the hem of her white sequin dress as she hurried through the arched side doors toward the outdoor gardens, leaving Arthur standing alone in the center of the ballroom floor. Arthur moved with slow, deliberate precision toward a central marble bar top. In a tight, handheld close-up, his weathered hands reached up to unbuckle his heavy gold Rolex watch. With a metallic click, he slammed the multi-thousand-dollar timepiece firmly onto the marble counter, the heavy thud sounding like a judge’s gavel signaling the end of mercy. Across the room, Arthur’s wife, an elegant older woman dressed in silk, hurried toward an antique wooden desk in the private alcove. She pulled a brass key from her clutch and quickly unlocked a wooden drawer with a loud sliding friction sound, pulling out a sealed leather folder that held decades of financial evidence against Julian’s secret shell companies.