CHAPTER 7: The Test
Even beaten half to death, Senna tried to play victim.
“Mr. Steele, I’m sure Mrs. Steele didn’t mean it. I never wanted to make a fuss.”
“Everyone else escalated things.”
Jett nodded thoughtfully. “I see. Well, I’m a fair man.”
“Right is right. Wrong is wrong.”
He helped me stand and walked me to Senna.
She cringed away.
“Get up.”
His voice wasn’t loud, but it commanded absolute obedience.
Despite her injuries, Senna struggled to her feet.
There was indeed a footprint on her right shoe.
Jett whispered in my ear, “Want to make a matching set?”
I smiled sweetly and ground my heel into her left foot.
She shrieked. I twisted harder, putting my full weight on that spike heel.
“Please, Ivy, please, I’m sorry-”
I stepped back.
Now both shoes had prints.
Completely different prints.
Senna went white.
“Funny,” Jett observed. “The prints don’t match. Who really stepped on your shoe?” “I… I didn’t see.”
Jett beckoned a guard. “She needs help remembering.”
The guard didn’t discriminate. Gender meant nothing when you hurt Mrs. Steele.
Senna’s screams filled the lounge until she broke.
“I REMEMBER! I did it myself! I scuffed my own shoe!”
“Please, Mr. Steele, mercy!”
Jett ignored her, addressing the room of bloodied executives.
“You’re all brilliant businessmen. Yet you couldn’t solve a simple mystery? Or did
you choose not to?”
1/2
“One second of logic would’ve cleared my wife. Instead, you helped them frame her. Beat her. Because you thought I wasn’t here to protect her?”
Silence.
“Three years. For three years, Steele Holdings will blacklist every one of you.” The men went pale. For most, this meant bankruptcy.
Jett looked at Raven. “You get special treatment.”
“Any company that works with you becomes my enemy. Any bank that lends to you. Any investor who takes your calls.”
“You’re dead in the water.”
Raven looked like his soul had left his body. “Mr. Steele, that’s… that’s a death
sentence.”
Jett was already walking away with me.
Raven screamed after us: “WAIT! I know a secret! About your wife!”
