Chapter 5
CHAPTER 5 — The Clean Ledger
Six months later, the world had forgotten the name Grant Mercer.
The news cycles had moved on to newer, fresher scandals, leaving the gold-coast brownstone to be sold to a tech executive from California.
I didn't stay in Chicago.
I moved back to New York, to a small, bright apartment in Brooklyn that smelled of fresh paint and lavender oil.
The windows faced east, letting in the first light of the morning sun without any shadows from oak trees or high walls.
I went back to work at the Attorney General’s office.
My old desk was waiting for me, the same green banker’s lamp casting a warm, steady glow over the spreadsheets.
It was a Wednesday afternoon when Dr. Ethan Reed called my office phone.
"Emily," his voice came through the speaker, clean and clear over the distance.
"Dr. Reed," I smiled, leaning back in my chair. "How is St. Catherine's?"
"Busy as always," he said, a faint chuckle in his tone. "I just wanted to check in. I saw the final sentencing report in the medical journal's legal section."
"He's officially processed into Terre Haute," I said, looking down at a stack of fresh bank records on my desk.
"He tried to appeal the asset forfeiture last week, but the judge threw it out without a hearing."
"Good," Dr. Reed said. "You deserve the peace, Emily."
"Thank you, Ethan," I said softly. "For looking at the injuries for three seconds."
"For knowing the difference between a shower and a fist."
"I didn't do anything any decent doctor wouldn't do," he replied. "You were the one who brought the weapon, Emily. I just called the perimeter line."
We hung up after a few minutes, the line clicking into a clean, quiet silence.
I looked at the monitor in front of me.
A new case. A new set of numbers. Another man who believed his wealth made him invisible to the rules of arithmetic.
I picked up my pen, the ink black and sharp against the white paper.
For three years, I had lived inside a prison where the walls were made of fear and the floorboards were warnings.
I had learned how to survive by becoming a ghost in my own home.
But ghosts don't hold hard drives.
Ghosts don't balance accounts.
I took a deep breath, my ribs expanding without any pain, the skin across my chest entirely healed and clear.
The world is full of men who think they can write their own rules in the dark.
They think the people they hurt are too broken to remember the math.
They are always wrong.
May you like
Because sooner or later, the audit always comes.
I lowered the pen to the paper and began to count.
