Chapter 6

Holland stood by the floor-to-ceiling window of his office. He looked down at the tiny yellow cabs crawling through Manhattan.

He rolled an unlit cigar between his fingers. The tobacco leaves crunched under his tight grip. His chest felt tight, filled with an unfamiliar, crawling irritation.

The intercom on his desk buzzed.

"Mr. Warner," the head of the finance department said. His voice trembled slightly. "The monthly trust fund transfer to your wife's account just bounced back. The account has been permanently closed."

Holland's hand jerked. The cigar snapped in half. Shreds of brown tobacco spilled onto the pristine carpet.

He stared at the speaker. Closed.

He had been absolutely certain that her dramatic exit and the divorce papers were just a negotiation tactic. A desperate play for his attention. But closing the account meant she was cutting off her only source of oxygen.

A sudden, sharp spike of panic hit his stomach. He hated the feeling. He immediately crushed it down, replacing it with cold anger.

The office door opened. Alex walked in, carrying a thick manila folder. He looked pale and sweating.

"Sir, the investigation report," Alex said, placing it on the desk.

Holland walked over and flipped the folder open.

The first photograph showed Corinna standing in the freezing rain in Brooklyn. She was dragging a scuffed suitcase up the steps of a decaying, red-brick apartment building.

Holland's breath hitched. The image of her in that filthy environment felt like a physical punch to his gut.

He flipped the page rapidly.

There were pawn shop receipts for her designer clothes. And then, a massive hospital bill from Mount Sinai.

Holland's eyes scanned the numbers. It was a deposit for an experimental, life-saving treatment for Jaycob.

His blood ran cold. He did not know. He had no idea she was pushed so close to the edge that she had to sell her clothes to keep her brother breathing.

He slammed his hand onto the desk.

"Why was I not informed that her brother's condition had deteriorated?" Holland yelled, his voice echoing off the glass walls.

Alex took a step back, swallowing hard. "Sir... a year ago, you gave a direct order to the security and medical liaison teams. You told them to block all communications and requests from the Massey family. You said you were tired of her using him as an excuse."

Holland froze.

The memory hit him. He had said those exact words to punish her for asking him to attend a charity dinner with her.

A heavy, suffocating wave of guilt rose in his throat. It tasted like ash.

But his massive ego, built over thirty years of absolute control, instantly threw up a wall of defense. It was not his fault. She should have begged harder.

He forced his eyes back to the report, desperate to find something to justify his anger.

He found it on the fourth page.

It was a surveillance photo taken through a basement window. Corinna was standing shoulder-to-shoulder with a man in a jewelry studio. The man was Zane.

In the photo, Corinna was smiling. It was a bright, genuine, glowing smile.

Holland stared at her mouth. In three years of marriage, she had never smiled at him like that. She only ever looked at him with careful, measured obedience.

A vicious, ugly spike of jealousy ripped through his chest. It burned like acid.

He threw the photo onto the desk.

"So this is why she is so brave," Holland sneered, his voice dripping with venom. "She found a new sponsor."

He pulled open the bottom drawer of his desk. He bypassed the corporate seals and pulled out a thin, old file. It was his psychological evaluation from his childhood at The Beacon, the elite psychiatric facility his mother had locked him in.

Tucked inside the file was a yellowed piece of drawing paper.

It was a crude crayon drawing of a little girl holding a sunflower in a dark room. In the bottom right corner, there was a single, childish letter: C.

Holland traced the letter with his thumb.

That little girl was the only person who had ever looked at him with pure kindness. She was his anchor in the dark.

He looked from the drawing to the photo of Corinna smiling at Zane. The contrast twisted his stomach. The girl in his memory was pure. The woman he married was a deceitful, vain opportunist.

He had absolutely no idea that the girl who drew the sunflower and the woman in the photo were the exact same person.

He shoved the drawing back into the drawer and slammed it shut. The loud bang echoed in the room.

His eyes turned dead and calculating. He was the king of Wall Street. No one walked away from him.

"Alex," Holland said, his voice dropping to a terrifyingly calm whisper. "Find out who supplies the raw materials for Zane's studio. Buy them out or threaten them. I want his entire supply chain severed by tomorrow morning."

Alex nodded nervously. "Yes, sir."

"I want her to realize that out there, she is nothing," Holland said to the empty room as Alex left.

He picked up the printout of Corinna's "Cocoon" design. He fed it into the paper shredder next to his desk.

He watched the sharp blades tear the beautiful design into tiny, meaningless strips.