Chapter 4: The Man Who Already Knew
Marcus Webb's apartment was in Midtown.
Fourteenth floor, corner unit, the kind of address that announced ambition louder than taste.
By the time Dominic's men confirmed Webb had not left the city, it was past nine o'clock.
Dominic went himself.
He didn't send anyone ahead.
Webb opened the door in a dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up, a glass of scotch in one hand.
When he saw Dominic, the glass stopped halfway to his mouth.
"Dominic.
I was going to call you tomorrow—"
"You resigned this afternoon."
"I did.
I've been thinking about it for a while.
The timing—"
"You cleared your office two hours after I drove to Brooklyn." Dominic stepped inside without being invited.
"Sit down, Marcus."
Webb didn't sit.
He moved toward the kitchen island, putting distance and marble between them.
"I don't know what you think you know—"
"I have the termination letter you sent to Sophia Carter.
The one with my forged signature."
The scotch glass went down on the counter.
"That memo was issued under the restructuring authority you gave me," Webb said.
His voice had shifted.
Steadier now.
Prepared.
"I had full discretion over junior contract staff."
"You had discretion to terminate contracts.
Not to forge my personal signature on the documentation."
"It was a standard authorized signature block.
Legal uses them all the time—"
"My grandfather taught me to sign my name," Dominic said.
"The loop goes left.
Yours goes right."
Webb said nothing.
"Why Sophia Carter specifically?" Dominic asked.
"There were eleven junior accountants in that office.
You removed one.
Her."
"Her performance metrics—"
"Were excellent.
I pulled her file twenty minutes ago.
Three consecutive positive reviews.
No complaints.
No disciplinary record." Dominic tilted his head slightly.
"You asked her to dinner.
She said no.
Three weeks later she was gone."
Webb's expression didn't break.
But his hand moved to the edge of the counter and stayed there.
"You can't prove intent from a dinner invitation."
"I don't need to prove intent from the dinner invitation.
I need to prove it from the letter, the forged signature, and the fact that you resigned the same afternoon I went to her building." Dominic paused.
"You have someone watching my movements."
It wasn't a question.
Webb picked up the scotch glass again.
"You're building a story out of coincidence."
"Then why did you clear your desk?"
"Because I've been planning to leave for months.
I told you, the timing—"
"Marcus." Dominic's voice dropped, not louder but quieter, which in his experience was far more effective.
"I've known you for eleven years.
I know when you're managing me.
Stop."
Webb set the glass down again.
The performance was over.
What replaced it was something colder and more careful.
"What do you want?" Webb said.
"The truth.
All of it.
Why Sophia.
Who else you've done this to.
And who told you I wouldn't notice."
Webb was quiet for a long moment.
He looked at the window, at the city lights beyond the glass, at some private calculation happening behind his eyes.
"You want the truth," he said finally.
"Here's the truth.
You left that woman alone for six years.
No contact, no support, no explanation.
You think you protected her by disappearing.
You didn't.
You just left her to manage alone while you went back to your life." He picked up the glass a third time.
"I didn't think you'd care enough to notice one name on a termination list."
"So it was a test."
"Call it what you like."
"A test of what?"
Webb looked at him directly.
"Whether she meant anything to you.
Or whether she was exactly what you told her she was.
Entertainment."
The word landed in the room like something physical.
Dominic was very still.
"And if I hadn't noticed?" he said.
"Then she would have found another job eventually.
And you would have gone on not noticing.
And everyone would have been exactly where they deserved to be."
"And Lily?"
Webb's expression shifted.
Just slightly.
"I didn't know about the child."
"She's five years old.
She took three trains and a bus alone across the city because her mother wouldn't ask for help."
Webb said nothing.
"You cost that woman her income, her stability, and three months of her daughter's security," Dominic said.
"Because she turned down dinner."
"It wasn't only the dinner." Webb's voice had lost its steadiness now.
"I've watched you for eleven years.
I watched what happened to her.
I watched you walk away and not look back.
And then she ends up in my office, brilliant and careful and completely alone, and you're not even paying attention—"
"So you wanted her for yourself."
The silence that followed was its own answer.
"And when she said no," Dominic continued, "you removed her.
So she'd have nowhere to go.
So she'd be desperate enough to reconsider."
Webb's hand came off the counter.
"I want every document you have related to Sophia Carter's termination," Dominic said.
"Every communication.
Every file.
Tonight.
And I want the names of anyone else in that office you removed for personal reasons."
"And if I don't?"
"Then I give the forged signature to my legal team in the morning and we have a very different conversation." Dominic picked up his coat.
"You have until midnight."
He walked to the door.
Behind him, Webb said: "She won't take you back, you know.
Whatever you're thinking.
She's not the same woman."
Dominic opened the door.
"I know," he said.
"Neither am I."
He was in the elevator when his phone rang.
Not his chief of security.
Not his lawyer.
Sophia.
He answered immediately.
Her voice was tight.
Controlled.
The voice of someone keeping fear at a specific, manageable distance.
"There's a man outside my building," she said.
May you like
"He's been there for forty minutes.
He's not one of yours."
