Chapter 5 - The Collapse of the EmpireBy noon, the penthouse was entirely silent again, but the silence was suffocating.
The television in the master bedroom was turned on—though Grant hadn't touched the remote. He sat on the edge of the king-sized bed, staring numbly at the screen.
BREAKING NEWS: SEC RAIDS ASHFORD BIOTECH HEADQUARTERS.
A live helicopter shot showed federal agents carrying cardboard boxes out of the sleek glass-and-steel skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan where Grant had spent the last decade of his life building his legacy. The stock ticker at the bottom of the screen was a blur of crimson red: ASFH down 68.4% and halted.
Grant’s phone—the corporate backup phone he kept in his desk drawer—vibrated violently.
He picked it up. It was a text message from Vanessa.
Grant, what is going on?! Reporters are outside my apartment building. My father’s lawyers are saying we need to sever all contact immediately. Don't call me.
Grant stared at the screen, a cold numbness washing over him.
Vanessa. The woman he had risked his marriage, his family, and his integrity for. The woman whose perfume still lingered faintly on the collar of his shirt.
She had abandoned him the second the ship began to sink.
He threw the phone across the bedroom. It shattered against the baseboard, the screen fracturing into a spiderweb of dead pixels.
He walked out into the hallway and stopped in front of the nursery door.
The room was completely empty. The four small indentations in the carpet where the crib had stood seemed like gravestones marking the death of everything he had ever built that actually mattered.
He had everything money could buy. A penthouse in Manhattan, a valuation in the hundreds of millions, a company that bore his name, and women who praised his ambition.
And in one single morning, it had all turned to dust.
Because he had underestimated Clare.
He walked back into his home office, picked up Nathan’s settlement agreement, and stared at the signature line.
There was no way out. If he fought, he would spend the next ten years of his life in a federal penitentiary while his assets were liquidated by the courts. If he signed, he would lose his company, his son, and his name—but he might keep his freedom.
Grant uncapped the Montblanc pen.
His hand trembled as the nib touched the heavy linen paper.
Grant Ashford.
The ink bled slightly into the grain of the page.
As he lifted the pen, the private elevator chime rang out through the penthouse.
Grant froze, his heart skipping a beat. Clare? Had she come back? Had she realized—
The elevator doors slid open with a soft hiss.
It wasn't Clare.
It was two federal marshals in dark tactical vests, holding a yellow warrant envelope.
May you like
"Grant Ashford?" the lead marshal asked, stepping into the hallway.
Grant dropped the pen. It rolled across the desk and fell softly onto the carpet.
