The screech of the Bright Harbor van’s sliding door echoed over the roar of State Street traffic, cutting through the freezing morning air like a blade.

Forty-eight hours after Marcus Vance’s arrest, the first blow landed at Holloway Urban Systems.

Grant sat at his mahogany desk reviewing morning project reports when Sarah Lin burst into his office, her face pale, holding a thick sheaf of delivery manifests and union notices.

"Grant, we have a crisis," Sarah said, dropping the papers onto his desk.

"What is it?"

"All three primary steel suppliers for the downtown rail terminal project just canceled their contracts simultaneously," Sarah said breathlessly. "Furthermore, the structural steelworkers' union just called a sudden, unannounced strike across all our active construction sites in the Loop."

Grant frowned, scanning the notices. "Unannounced? We signed a three-year collective bargaining agreement six months ago with zero grievances. Why are they walking out now?"

"They claim safety violations regarding raw material inspections," Sarah explained. "But our site inspectors confirmed our materials are fully certified. It’s a coordinated squeeze. And look at this—the city zoning board just placed a retroactive environmental hold on our foundation permits for the waterfront logistics hub."

Grant leaned back in his chair, his mind racing through the corporate connections.

It wasn't a coincidence. It was retaliation.

"Victor Vance," Grant said quietly.

Sarah’s eyes widened. "Victor Vance? The dock syndicate boss? What does he have to do with this?"

"Marcus Vance was Victor’s younger brother," Grant said, standing up and walking toward the glass wall overlooking the Chicago skyline. "When Marcus went down, he took a significant portion of Victor’s secondary revenue streams with him. Victor is retaliating by hitting my primary infrastructure projects."

"If we can't secure steel and resolve the strike within seventy-two hours, we default on our municipal contracts," Sarah warned, her voice tight with panic. "The financial penalties will run into the tens of millions. Our board will panic, and our institutional investors will start dumping stock."

Before Grant could answer, his private desk phone rang.

He walked over and picked up the receiver.

"Grant Holloway," he said flatly.

A smooth, chillingly polite voice answered on the other end. "Mr. Holloway. I trust you're enjoying your morning coffee."

"Victor Vance," Grant said.

"The very same," Victor chuckled softly over the line. "I understand you've been doing some humanitarian work lately. Taking in stray children, playing the knight in shining armor. It's a noble hobby, Mr. Holloway. But in Chicago, noble hobbies have a tendency to become very expensive very quickly."

"If you think choking my supply lines will stop me from pursuing the trafficking ring Marcus and Beverly ran, you're gravely mistaken," Grant said, his voice dropping into an icy register.

"I don't care about Marcus or Beverly," Victor replied smoothly. "They were incompetent fools who brought federal heat onto my city. What I care about is disruption. You disrupted my operations, Mr. Holloway. Now I am disrupting yours. Drop your civil lawsuit against the Bright Harbor assets, sign over the development rights for the downtown rail terminal to one of my shell companies, and your steel shipments will resume by tomorrow morning."

"And if I refuse?"

"Then by the end of the week, Holloway Urban Systems will be bankrupt, your board will mutiny, and you'll be spending every dime you have defending yourself against endless regulatory investigations."

The line went dead with a sharp click.

Grant lowered the phone slowly. His jaw was clenched so tight a muscle twitched in his cheek.

The door to his office clicked open, and Maya stepped inside.

She wore a soft grey sweater and dark trousers, her left arm still resting comfortably in its blue cast. Behind her trailed seven-month-old Ellie, who was being carried carefully by the pediatric nurse. Maya walked over to Grant’s desk, her dark eyes looking up at him with an intuitive maturity that defied her eight years.

"You look mad," Maya said quietly.

Grant took a breath, letting the anger drain from his face as he looked down at her. He crouched down so he was at eye level with her.

"I'm not mad, Maya," Grant said, offering a reassuring smile. "Just dealing with some difficult business partners."

"Is it the bad men from the docks?" Maya asked, her voice dropping to a nervous whisper. "Mrs. Vale used to talk about them. She said if anyone ever crossed Victor Vance, they disappeared before sunset."

Grant gently touched her good shoulder. "Nobody is disappearing. And nobody is going to hurt you or Ellie. I promise you that."

Maya reached into her pocket, pulled out a small, folded piece of paper she had been carrying all morning, and handed it to him.

"What's this?" Grant asked, unfolding it.

It was a page torn from a ledger, covered in Mrs. Vale's meticulous handwriting—listing not just adoption fees, but specific warehouse addresses along the southern docks where illegal shipments were stored before being distributed across the city.

"Mrs. Vale kept her real books in the music room behind the piano," Maya explained earnestly. "I memorized where she hid them before the police came. When I cleaned her desk last month, I copied this page because she said it was her insurance policy against the men with guns."