Chapter 8 - Shadows and Suspicions
By five o'clock that afternoon,
the financial world was reeling from the news.
Mercer Urban Group had officially suspended Grant Mercer from his duties as Chief Executive Officer,
pending an internal forensic investigation into financial irregularities.
Vanessa Cole had been escorted from the building by private security guards,
her personal belongings packed into two cardboard boxes.
I sat in the quiet library of my new apartment,
reviewing a stack of legal documents with Victoria.
Despite the massive victory in the boardroom,
a strange sense of caution remained in my chest.
Grant was a cornered animal,
and a man like Grant Mercer did not accept defeat easily.
Across town,
in a dimly lit private lounge in downtown Boston,
Grant sat at a corner table,
pouring his third glass of straight whiskey.
Vanessa sat across from him,
her nails digging into the velvet seat cushions,
her eyes dark with anger.
"She set us up, Grant,"
Vanessa spat out,
her voice trembling with rage.
"She knew about the offshore accounts.
She knew about the 2023 documents.
She has been planning this for months!"
"Shut up, Vanessa,"
Grant growled,
staring into his amber glass.
"You were the compliance officer.
You assured me those signature transfers were legally airtight!"
"Don't put this all on me!"
Vanessa hissed,
leaning across the table.
"You wanted her out!
You wanted to take full credit for Harborview Tower!
You called her a failure who couldn't even give you a child!"
At the mention of the child,
Grant paused,
his whiskey glass stopping halfway to his lips.
A sudden,
troubling memory flashed through his mind.
He remembered the night he broke the news to me in our bedroom.
He remembered how I had stood by the bed,
my hand deep inside my robe pocket.
He remembered how calm I had been,
how I hadn't cried,
how I had stepped past him with a look of strange, detached pity.
"She was holding something,"
Grant muttered under his breath,
his brow furrowing.
"What?"
Vanessa asked,
frowning at him.
"That night,"
Grant said,
his eyes narrowing in deep suspicion.
"Before I told her about the divorce.
I heard her whispering in the hallway.
She was standing near the guest room.
And when I came into the bedroom,
she had her hand hidden inside her pocket the entire time."
Vanessa stared at him,
her sharp mind instantly connecting the dots.
"She was undergoing IVF treatments last month, Grant,"
Vanessa whispered,
her voice dropping into a sinister tone.
"She went to the New England Fertility Center three times while you were away in New York."
Grant’s breath hitched in his throat.
"She told me those treatments failed,"
Grant said,
though his voice lacked conviction.
"The doctor told us the embryo transfer was unsuccessful."
"Did you see the medical report yourself?"
Vanessa demanded,
her eyes glittering with malice.
"Or did you just take her word for it because you were too busy spending time with me?"
Grant set his glass down on the table with a sharp crack.
His heart began beating with a strange,
terrifying rhythm.
If Ellie was pregnant...
If she was carrying a Mercer heir while divorcing him for corporate fraud...
The public sympathy would shatter him completely.
The courts would strip him of his remaining personal wealth to support his legal child.
And the narrative that he had abandoned a pregnant wife for his mistress would ruin his reputation permanently.
"Find out,"
Grant ordered Vanessa,
his voice low and dangerously quiet.
"Use whoever you need to.
Hack her medical records,
follow her,
bribe her nurses.
I want to know if Ellie Vance is carrying my child."
Vanessa smiled,
a cold,
calculating expression returning to her face.
"Consider it done, Grant,"
she whispered.
May you like
"If she thinks she can hide an heir from us,
she is severely mistaken."
