That night, Aisha pulled a small plastic container from her kitchen cabinet.
Inside was a portion of green juice.
Marcus stared at it. “You kept it?”
Aisha’s expression didn’t change. “I saw Veronica pour something into the blender last week. She told me not to worry about it. Told me it was… supplements.”
Marcus’s stomach twisted. “And you saved it.”
“I’ve worked for rich folks long enough to know,” Aisha said. “When someone tells you not to ask questions, you better start asking them in your head.”
Marcus stared at the container like it was a snake.
“What do we do?” he asked.
Aisha reached into a drawer and pulled out an old phone, the kind you could buy at a gas station with cash. “We need proof. Real proof. Not your word. Not mine. Something that holds up when money starts talking.”
Marcus blinked. “You have a burner phone?”
Aisha shrugged. “I live in a world where you don’t assume anyone’s coming to save you.”
He didn’t have a comeback for that.
Aisha told him her plan in a voice that didn’t shake:
Collect evidence.
Find someone outside Ryan’s reach.
Force the truth into the light, where it couldn’t be quietly buried.
Marcus listened, then realized the terrifying part.
Aisha wasn’t improvising.
She was strategizing like someone who’d had to.
“Who do we trust?” Marcus asked.
Aisha’s eyes flickered toward the window, toward Mrs. Kora’s porch, toward the invisible web of the city.
“Not your friends,” she said. “Not the people who smile at you because you’re rich. We need someone who hates corruption more than they love money.”
Marcus almost laughed, but it came out ragged. “That narrows it.”
Aisha’s mouth twitched, not quite humor, more like grim recognition. “I know someone.”
Marcus leaned forward. “Who?”
Aisha hesitated just long enough for Marcus to feel the weight of her caution.
“My cousin,” she said finally. “Tanya. She works in the DA’s office. Not high up. But she’s stubborn, and she’s clean.”
Marcus’s mind latched onto the word clean like it was oxygen. “Call her.”
Aisha shook her head. “Not yet. If your brother’s bought Captain Reed, he’s probably bought others. We go careful.”
Marcus felt impatience rise, the old instinct to command a solution into existence.
Then he remembered Veronica’s voice, calm and deadly.
I doubled the dose.
Impatience, he realized, got people killed.
He nodded. “Okay. Careful.”
Aisha studied him, then handed him the burner phone.
“You don’t call anyone,” she said. “Not yet. But you start writing down everything you remember. Every time you felt sick. Every time Veronica made you that juice. Every person who had access.”
Marcus stared at the phone, then at the notebook she shoved into his hands.
“You’re treating this like an investigation,” he said.
Aisha’s eyes didn’t soften. “It is.”
4. Veronica’s Smile, Ryan’s Hunger
While Marcus recovered in Aisha’s house, his life continued without him.
On television, the world didn’t know he was missing.
They knew he was “resting.”
Veronica gave interviews outside the Hail Foundation, her hand elegantly placed over her heart as she spoke about Marcus’s “health scare.”
Ryan stood beside her like a supportive brother, his smile polished.
Marcus watched the broadcast in Aisha’s living room, his stomach turning.
Veronica’s voice came through the screen like honey.
“Marcus has been under a great deal of stress,” she said. “He’s always been so driven. We’re just grateful he’s taking time to recover.”
A reporter asked about rumors of tension within the company.
Ryan laughed lightly. “Tension? No. We’re a family.”
Marcus almost threw the remote.
Aisha reached over and turned off the TV.
“Don’t feed them your anger,” she said. “Save it.”
Marcus stared at the dark screen.
“How long until they notice I’m gone?” he asked.
Aisha didn’t hesitate. “They’ve already noticed. They’re just deciding what story to tell.”
Marcus swallowed. “And if they decide the story is that I’m dead?”
Aisha’s expression went hard. “Then we make sure their lie collapses in public.”
5. The Return to the Mansion
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