Chapter 4 - Ryan’s Investigation and the River North Site
The rain had started by 3:00 a.m., drumming a relentless, melancholic rhythm against the windshield of Ryan’s SUV as he drove through the deserted streets of downtown Chicago. Lake Geneva was forty-five miles behind him, but the dark waters of Lake Michigan seemed to follow him south into the towering concrete canyons of River North.
Two years ago, Michael Bennett had fallen from the tenth-floor scaffolding of a luxury high-rise development site on Grand Avenue. At the time, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the local police had ruled it an accidental industrial collapse caused by a faulty safety harness bracket.
Ryan parked across the street from the abandoned construction skeleton—now a finished, gleaming thirty-story glass tower—and pulled out a worn manila folder. It was the original accident report he had requested from a private investigator friend earlier that night.
He flipped open the pages, scanning the names of the subcontractors, the site managers, and the safety inspectors who had signed off on the project back then.
Then his eyes locked on a signature at the bottom of the equipment maintenance log.
Ethan Caldwell.
As project coordinator for the development firm, Ethan hadn't just been Michael’s best friend; he had been directly responsible for site safety inspections during the final phase of exterior glazing and scaffolding assembly.
Ryan’s phone buzzed violently against the dashboard.
He answered immediately. “Ryan here.”
“Ryan, it’s Grace,” her voice came through the speaker, breathless and tense. “You need to get back to Lake Geneva or check your email right now. Detective Miller just sent over the preliminary financial audit on Ethan’s personal bank accounts that the judge subpoenaed three hours ago.”
“What did they find?” Ryan asked, leaning forward over the steering wheel.
“It’s not just a few thousand dollars,” Grace said, her voice shaking slightly. “Over the last twenty-four months, Ethan has made forty-eight separate cash wire transfers to a private offshore account registered under a shell corporation in Delaware. Total amount? Over four hundred thousand dollars.”
Ryan whistled low. “Hush money.”
“Exactly,” Grace confirmed. “And guess where the largest wire transfer originated from? Last Thursday—three days before the wedding—fifty thousand dollars was wired from Ethan’s personal account to a checking account belonging to a woman named Sarah Jenkins.”
Ryan’s eyes narrowed. “Sarah Jenkins? Who is she?”
“According to public records, she was an administrative assistant at the River North construction firm during the exact month Michael died,” Grace replied. “And get this—she was fired from her job four days after Michael’s funeral, packed up her apartment, and dropped off the grid.”
Ryan slammed his hand against the steering wheel. “She’s the woman in the scarf. The one who saw what happened on the tenth floor.”
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“The police are looking for her, but her last known address in Evanston is vacant,” Grace urged. “Ryan, be careful. If Ethan was paying her off to keep quiet, and she’s suddenly surfaced in Wisconsin during the wedding week, she might still be in the area.”
“I’m checking every motel between here and the state line,” Ryan said, putting the SUV into drive. “We’re going to find Sarah Jenkins before Ethan’s lawyers realize the house of cards is collapsing.”
