CHAPTER 8 – FIVE MINUTES
Conrad Sterling was not exaggerating when he said five minutes.
He did not mean the firm would legally cease to exist in that time. Real collapses require filings, board votes, creditor actions, investigations, settlements, signatures. But power can end long before paperwork finishes.
At minute one, the lead lender suspended discretionary access.
At minute two, two major investors requested immediate withdrawal rights.
At minute three, the general counsel advised Grant in writing—unreadable to the audience, but devastating to the recipient—that he should not make further statements without independent counsel.
At minute four, the board scheduled an emergency vote to remove Grant from operational authority pending review.
At minute five, the first partner resigned.
Grant received the call in the penthouse hallway after security arrived.
He did not shout. He barely spoke. His face simply emptied as if someone had unplugged the current that animated him.
Ava sat on the sofa now with a blanket around her shoulders. A female security officer had cleared glass from the immediate area and photographed the scene. The phone remained near Ava, still connected to Conrad. Broken glass stayed visible where documented. White orchid petals remained on the marble like evidence too beautiful to move.
Mara arrived twenty minutes later in a black coat, silver hair pinned neatly, eyes sharp enough to cut through Grant’s last attempts at dignity.
She spoke first to Ava, not to him.
“Do you want medical attention?”
“Yes,” Ava said.
Grant looked surprised.
That hurt more than Ava expected. Even now, after everything, some part of him thought she would prioritize managing consequences over caring for herself. Perhaps because that was what he always did.
Mara turned to him. “Mr. Mercer, you need to leave the residence pending formal proceedings.”
Grant’s jaw tightened. “This is my home.”
Ava looked up.
“No,” she said. “It was where I kept trying to build one.”
That sentence stopped him.
Not because it convinced him.
Because it sounded too much like truth to dismiss quickly.
Mara continued. “Security will escort you. You may take your wallet and keys. Nothing else until inventory.”
Grant laughed bitterly. “Inventory? I’m not a thief.”
No one answered.
Silence did its work.
He looked at Ava one last time. His eyes moved over her cheek, her bruised hand, the cream silk blouse, the phone, the gold accessory on the table.
For a moment, he seemed to see the scene as others would see it.
A wife on the floor.
A husband walking away.
A call he failed to stop.
A firm already falling.
He said, very softly, “I didn’t think you’d call him.”
Ava’s reply came without hesitation.
May you like
“I know.”
And that was the most devastating indictment of all.
