Chapter 13 - The Floor Above the City
I did not go to the office.
Every reckless part of me wanted to.
The father in me stayed home.
Chicago police surrounded Harrison Capital within minutes. Nolan locked himself inside the server room on the forty-second floor.
Maya stood beside Evan's laptop.
“He's destroying everything.”
“No,” Evan said. “He's destroying copies.”
Our forensic backups were off-site.
Nolan did not know because I had quietly changed the company's disaster-recovery system six months earlier.
For once, one of my obsessions with control helped.
At 8:17 p.m., police took him into custody.
No shots were fired.
I expected relief.
Instead I felt hollow.
Maya said, “People like him count on good memories being stronger than bad evidence.”
I looked at her. “Where did you learn that?”
“Living with adults.”
The next morning, reporters gathered outside Lakeview and Harrison Capital. Whitmore released a statement denying wrongdoing and calling Nolan a “rogue financial actor.”
He also announced the school's annual Founders Gala would continue as scheduled on Friday.
“That's insane,” Priya said over video call.
“No,” Maya replied. “It's smart.”
We all looked at her.
“He wants rich parents in a ballroom repeating his version before investigators finish theirs.”
She was right.
By noon, anonymous accounts online were calling Maya a liar. Someone posted shelter records. Someone else posted an old photo of her mother being arrested for shoplifting food years earlier.
Maya stared at the screen until her face went white.
“Turn it off,” I said.
“She stole groceries because we didn't have food.”
“I said turn it off.”
Maya snapped, “You don't get to turn off my life when it makes you uncomfortable.”
Then she ran upstairs.
Sophie looked at me. “You did it again.”
“Did what?”
“Try to control the bad part instead of sitting with it.”
I closed my eyes.
Eight years old.
And somehow she was raising me.
That evening, Maya came downstairs carrying her backpack.
“I'm leaving.”
“No.”
“You can't stop me.”
“Where will you go?”
She looked toward the front door.
May you like
“Somewhere your daughter doesn't get threatened because of me.”
Then every light in the house went out.
