Chapter 6

The morning sun sliced through the horizontal blinds of the kitchen, casting sharp lines of light across the granite counter.

Karli stood at the stove, wearing an oversized, faded gray t-shirt she had dug out of her bag. Her right forearm was still wrapped in thick white gauze, making the simple motion of cracking an egg slightly awkward. She winced as she gripped the pan handle, but she pushed through the discomfort and cracked two eggs into the sizzling pan.

Darnell walked out of the hallway. He wore a dark, tailored suit with no visible designer labels. He stopped at the edge of the kitchen, his senses immediately hit by the smell of melting butter and fresh coffee.

He pulled out a metal barstool and sat down. He watched in silence as Karli expertly slid the fried eggs and toasted bread onto a ceramic plate and pushed it across the counter toward him.

Karli poured black coffee into a mug. She didn't look at him, keeping her tone light and strictly business. She told him breakfast was her way of offsetting her half of the rent, and that she was leaving immediately to hunt for a job.

Darnell took a sip of the scalding coffee. He hid the flicker of surprise in his eyes behind the rim of the mug. He gave a low grunt of acknowledgment and didn't ask any questions.

Karli ate her toast standing up. She washed her plate, grabbed her canvas bag, and walked out the front door, her steps hurried as she rushed to catch the morning subway.

Darnell walked to the living room window. He looked down at the busy street below, his eyes tracking Karli's small figure until she disappeared down the concrete stairs of the subway station.

He turned away from the window and walked into his home office. He pressed his hand against a specific wooden panel on the bookshelf. The biometric scanner beeped softly. The entire shelf swung inward, revealing a private, stainless-steel elevator.

The elevator dropped smoothly to the sub-basement VIP garage. The doors slid open to reveal a gleaming, bulletproof black Rolls-Royce Phantom.

Mitch, his personal driver, stood at attention and pulled open the heavy rear door. Darnell stepped inside. The relaxed, quiet roommate vanished. The cold, untouchable CEO of Aegis Conglomerate took his place.

The Rolls-Royce glided out of the garage, merging seamlessly into the chaotic Chicago traffic, heading straight for the towering glass monolith of the Aegis headquarters.

The car pulled into the secure underground drop-off. Julian Croft was already standing there, holding a highly encrypted tablet.

Darnell walked into the private executive elevator flanked by four massive security details. Julian immediately began reading the morning briefing, rattling off numbers for a multi-billion dollar cross-border acquisition.

The elevator chimed at the 88th floor. Darnell pushed open the massive mahogany double doors to his office and sat behind a desk made of a single slab of black glass.

Julian placed a thick, gold-embossed business proposal on the desk. He tapped the cover, noting that it was the latest joint-venture pitch submitted by the Lewis family enterprise.

Darnell heard the name 'Lewis'. His fingers stopped tapping the glass. The temperature in the room seemed to plummet. His eyes turned to absolute ice.

He stared at the profit-sharing clauses on the first page. A cruel, razor-sharp smirk pulled at the corner of his mouth.

Julian, highly attuned to his boss's moods, felt a cold sweat break out on the back of his neck. He hesitantly asked if he should send the file down to the risk assessment department for review.

Darnell didn't hesitate. He picked up a heavy black fountain pen. He pressed the nib hard against the thick paper and drew a massive, jagged red 'X' across the entire cover of the proposal.

He tossed the ruined document back at Julian. His voice was devoid of any human warmth. He ordered Julian to cut off every single line of credit the Lewis family had in Chicago. Total financial blockade.

Julian swallowed hard. He had no idea how the Lewis family had triggered this execution, but he nodded sharply, turned, and practically ran out of the office to make the calls.

Miles away, on a downtown sidewalk in the cool morning air, Karli walked out of the glass doors of a medical supply company. She brushed a damp strand of hair from her forehead.

She looked down at her resume. The HR manager hadn't even offered her a seat. The moment the background check flagged her three-year felony prison sentence, she was shown the door.

Karli took a deep, shaky breath. She pushed the crushing weight of failure down into her stomach. She walked to a rusted vending machine on the corner and bought a cheap bottle of water.

She tilted her head back to drink. Her eyes caught the massive LED billboard flashing above Michigan Avenue.

It was a high-production commercial for the Aegis Conglomerate. The camera panned over a fleet of luxury cars, briefly showing the broad, imposing back of the CEO stepping into a Rolls-Royce.

Karli lowered her water bottle. She muttered to herself that people in that world didn't have to worry about background checks. She tossed the empty plastic bottle into a trash can and started walking toward the next address on her list.

At 5:00 PM, inside the Lewis Enterprise headquarters, Warren slammed his phone down so hard the plastic cracked. He grabbed a priceless antique vase from his desk and hurled it against the wall, shattering it into a thousand pieces.

Myra rushed into the office, her hands covering her mouth in terror, asking what had happened. Warren gripped his hair, his face red and sweating. He screamed that the banks had pulled their loans and Aegis had blacklisted them. Their cash flow was dead.

Sitting in the back of his Rolls-Royce, Darnell watched the live security feed of Warren's meltdown on the screen built into the partition. He watched the vase shatter. He pressed the power button, turning the screen black, and coldly told Mitch to drive back to the apartment.