Chapter 4 - The Sins of the SonGrant Holloway sat in his corner office on the fortieth floor of the Holloway Tower downtown, staring blankly at his computer screen. The stock price for Holloway Select Markets had just dipped 4.2% in twenty minutes—an unprecedented drop triggered by an anonymous tip sent to three major financial news outlets regarding "irregularities in supply chain accounting."
His phone buzzed incessantly. Investors were panicking. Board members were demanding an emergency meeting.
The heavy oak door to his office slammed open without a knock.
Grant flinched, looking up angrily. "I told my secretary I was not to be disturbed—"
It wasn't his secretary.
It was Detective Miller of the Chicago Police Department’s Special Victims Unit. Miller was a mountain of a man with salt-and-pepper hair, permanent scowl lines around his mouth, and a silver wedding ring that he’d worn for thirty years.
Miller also ate two slices of my apple cobbler every single Sunday after church.
"Grant Holloway?" Miller asked, his voice a gravelly rumble that echoed off the mahogany walls.
Grant stood up, forcing a smooth, practiced corporate smile onto his face, though his eye twitched. "Detective. I assume this is about the minor logistics hiccup at our warehouse? My legal team is already handling—"
"This isn't about warehouse logistics, son," Miller interrupted, stepping forward and dropping a heavy manila folder onto Grant’s pristine glass desk.
Grant looked down at the folder. "What is this?"
"This," Miller said slowly, leaning his weight onto his hands against the desk, "is a formal domestic abuse complaint filed on behalf of Hannah Holloway, supported by photographic evidence of physical trauma, medical records from Mercy Hospital’s emergency room, and eyewitness testimony from an uninvolved party."
Grant’s face drained of color. "That’s... that’s completely absurd. My wife fell down the stairs. She’s clumsy. Everyone knows she’s prone to—"
"She fell down the stairs?" Miller cut him off, his voice dropping an octave, turning deadly quiet. "With hand-shaped bruising around her throat and clumps of hair torn out by the roots? That’s some one-in-a-million staircase you’ve got in that mansion, Grant."
Grant tried to regain his composure, puffing out his chest. "You can't touch me, Detective. My family contributes heavily to the Police Widows and Orphans Fund. You pull a stunt like this, and I’ll have your badge before you can clock out."
Miller didn't blink. He reached out, grabbed Grant by the expensive silk lapels of his Brioni suit, and yanked him across the desk until their noses were an inch apart.
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"Listen to me, you miserable little coward," Miller whispered, his breath hot against Grant’s face. "Evelyn Carter raised that girl on the South Side with calluses on her hands and honesty in her heart. You laid a hand on her child in my city. You have twenty-four hours to sign an unconditional divorce settlement relinquishing all claims to her assets, or I’m slapping cuffs on you for felony aggravated domestic battery and witness intimidation. Am I making myself clear?"
Grant stared into the detective’s unyielding eyes and realized, with a sickening jolt of absolute terror, that his money couldn't save him here.
