Chapter 16
Chapter 16: The Visitor’s Cage
The visiting room at Cook County Division 11 smelled exactly like despair—stale floor wax, industrial bleach, and cold, metallic sweat.
I sat behind a thick sheet of scratched plexiglass, the gold fountain pen clipped neatly to the pocket of my blazer. On my side of the glass was a standard legal discovery tablet provided by Ethan’s courier service.
The heavy steel door on the opposite side buzzed open.
Preston Caldwell stepped into the cage.
He was wearing a bright orange inmate jumpsuit. His hair had been shaved close to his scalp, his face was pale and drawn, and there was a dark, purple bruise healing along his jawline—clear evidence that the former golden boy of Chicago tech wasn't surviving well in the general population.
But when his eyes locked onto me through the glass, that old, toxic arrogance twisted his features into a jagged grin.
He sat down, picking up the heavy gray plastic phone receiver. I picked up mine.
“Look at you,” Preston sneered, his voice buzzing through the cheap electronic earpiece. “The queen of River North. Did you bring your daddy’s SUVs with you today, Maya? Or are they parked outside waiting to jump-start my dead heart?”
“You look terrible, Preston,” I said, my voice completely flat. “I hear Cook County isn’t known for its country-club amenities.”
“Shut up!” he hissed, slamming his free hand against the metal counter, his eyes turning wild and bloodshot. “You think you won? You think you destroyed my family and walked away clean? My dad is in the ICU, my mother is in handcuffs in Paris, and I’m facing ten years because of your little temper tantrum over breakfast!”
“You’re facing ten years because you stole $500,000 to cover up your domestic assault of Vanessa King,” I corrected him coldly. “Don’t confuse my reaction with your criminality.”
Preston let out an ugly, mocking laugh, leaning closer to the plexiglass until his hot breath fogged up the surface.
“Vanessa was a nobody. Just like you were before your dad gave you that credit line,” he whispered. “But let’s talk about your dad, shall we? Did old Julian tell you about the Port of Newark in 2022? Did he tell you about the three shipping containers of unmanifested medical electronics that went missing right before his company went public?”
I didn't blink. “Richard told me you have some old customs files. I’m not impressed, Preston. Legacy gray-market paperwork isn't going to get you out of a federal fraud charge.”
“It’s not just paperwork, you stupid bitch!” Preston grinned, pulling a small, printed sheet of paper from his jumpsuit pocket and pressing it against the glass. It was a digital access keycode string. “I have the original digital encryption manifests linked to a private server in Switzerland. The moment my defense lawyer submits this to the federal prosecutor this afternoon, your dad’s logistics firm gets hit with an immediate asset-freezing injunction. The feds will seize everything he owns—including that pretty little pharmacy you just bought with his dirty money.”
He leaned back, looking completely triumphant.
“So here’s the new deal, Maya,” Preston commanded, his voice dripping with venomous satisfaction. “You have your dad drop the civil suits. You have his lawyers construct a narrative that clears my name of the fraud charges. You get me out of here by Friday, or I wipe the Vance name off the face of this city.”
I looked at the access code pressed against the glass. Then, I pulled the gold fountain pen from my pocket, uncapped it, and laid the discovery tablet flat on the counter.
“Your lawyer already uploaded the preliminary discovery cache to this terminal for review before I walked in, Preston,” I said softly, using the pen’s metallic tip to tap the tablet screen. “Let’s see if your digital keys are actually valid.”
May you like
I plugged the gold pen directly into the tablet’s side interface port.
A tiny, invisible blue LED light on the pen’s clip flickered twice.
