Chapter 16
The holding facility at Rikers Island was suffocatingly bleak, reeking of cheap industrial bleach and desperation. Grace and Ethan sat in a dim, soundproofed interrogation room across a scratched aluminum table from a devastated, haggard Sabrina Vale. The breathtaking, glamorous woman who had worn an ivory silk gown just twenty-four hours ago was entirely gone. Her face was severely bruised and swollen a dark purple from the devastating kick Grace had delivered, and her eyes were wide with frantic, unadulterated panic.
"I don't want to die! You have to get me out of here!" Sabrina shrieked, her handcuffed hands slamming violently against the metal table.
"Your brother died twenty minutes ago from an induced heart attack, Sabrina," Ethan said in a freezing, emotionless tone. "You know exactly what that means. It wasn't a medical anomaly. If you don't tell us exactly who is orchestrating this, you will be the next one in a body bag."
Hearing the confirmation of Vance’s death, Sabrina let out a horrified, blood-curdling wail, her entire body shaking uncontrollably. She buried her bruised face in her hands, tears streaming down her pale cheeks, completely ruining the last remnants of her makeup.
"I... I don't know their names!" Sabrina sobbed, her eyes darting around the small room as if the concrete walls were about to crush her. "Vance was the point of contact! He owed a staggering amount of money to underground casinos in Macau. They approached Vance, promised to erase the debt, and offered us twenty percent of your empire if... if I successfully secured legal guardianship of Lily."
"And if I refused to sign the marital trusts?" Ethan clenched his fists, struggling to suppress the violent urge to strangle the manipulative woman across from him.
"They... they forced us to inject her with high-grade sedatives every day," Sabrina stammered, avoiding Ethan’s murderous gaze. "They said Lily had seen something she wasn't supposed to see the night her parents died in that car crash. They needed to ensure she remained completely mute until... until they could arrange another 'accident' for her after the trusts were activated."
Grace slammed both hands onto the table, standing up so abruptly her chair scraped loudly against the concrete. The lethal aura radiating from the former operative made Sabrina shrink back and whimper. "Are you saying the car crash that killed Mr. Caldwell's brother wasn't a tragic accident?" Grace demanded coldly.
"I don't know! I swear!" Sabrina bawled. "Vance only took orders from one man. A guy who always wore a pristine black suit, with a small scar shaped like a crescent moon on the back of his neck. He called himself 'The Cleaner'."
A crescent moon scar. Grace closed her eyes, rapidly sifting through her eidetic memory of the enlarged security footage from the ballroom. The hair of the man in the black suit had been cut in a high, military fade... and there, barely visible against the skin... a faint, crescent-shaped scar.
"What do they want with Mr. Caldwell's assets?" Grace pressed aggressively.
"Not the money..." Sabrina wheezed, her eyes entirely hollow. "They want unrestricted access to the international shipping ports Ethan’s company controls. They need a secure, uninspected pipeline to smuggle military-grade weapons into the Eastern Seaboard."
Grace turned to Ethan, giving a grim, confirming nod. They had exactly what they needed. Sabrina was now a severed puppet, entirely useless to the syndicate.
The moment they stepped out of the interrogation room, the prison’s emergency sirens suddenly began wailing with a deafening, piercing shriek. Every automated magnetic door in the sector slammed shut and locked heavily.
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"Code Red! Hostile breach in the medical sector!" The prison's public address system blared.
Grace instantly drew a concealed sidearm from her leather jacket, pulling Ethan back into a blind corner. "They are here to silence Sabrina," she whispered. "Mr. Caldwell, stay right behind me."
