Chapter 8 - FIFTY MILLION DOLLARS
Fifty million dollars sounds enormous until you understand what someone wants you to bury beneath it.
Richard asked me to meet him in Rachel’s office.
I refused to be alone with him.
He arrived with two attorneys and a settlement agreement thick enough to look like a novel.
Richard sat across from me.
For the first time since Mark’s death, he looked tired.
“Fifty million,” he repeated.
Rachel didn’t touch the papers.
“In exchange for what?”
Richard looked at me.
“Emily keeps Mark’s trust. Keeps the shares financially.”
“Financially?” Rachel asked.
“No voting rights.”
There it was.
“And?”
“No further accusations regarding Plant Four.”
“Accusations?” I said. “Your signature is on the reports.”
His jaw tightened.
“Documents can be misunderstood.”
“Dead workers are harder to misunderstand.”
One attorney interrupted.
“Mrs. Bennett, nobody here is admitting liability.”
I stared at Richard.
“Why did Mark hate you?”
That landed.
“He didn’t.”
“You sure?”
Richard’s voice cracked slightly.
“My son loved me.”
“Then why did he spend his final weeks protecting me from you?”
Richard looked toward the window.
For one moment, he seemed like an old man instead of a powerful one.
“I made mistakes.”
“What kind?”
“Business mistakes.”
“Did you know Mark was exposed?”
Silence.
“Did you know?”
His attorney touched his sleeve.
“Richard.”
But he answered.
“I knew he worked there.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
He stood.
“Do you think I wanted my son sick?”
“No.”
That stopped him.
“I think you wanted the company safe more than you wanted people safe.”
His face hardened again.
Rachel pushed the settlement papers back.
“We’re done.”
Richard leaned toward me.
“You have a daughter coming.”
“I know.”
“Think about her.”
“I am.”
His voice dropped.
“You can make her rich beyond anything Mark imagined.”
I almost laughed.
“You still don’t understand your son.”
Richard’s eyes narrowed.
“He didn’t care about making her rich.”
“What did he care about?”
“Making sure she didn’t grow up thinking money excuses everything.”
Richard left.
That night, I watched another video Mark had scheduled inside the trust archive.
“Em, if Dad offers you fifty million, congratulations.”
I stared at the screen.
He smiled weakly.
“I guessed forty.”
Even through grief, I laughed.
Then Mark became serious.
“Don’t reject it because you’re angry.”
I frowned.
“Reject it only if accepting would make you someone you don’t want Lily to become.”
Then he told me the next secret.
The fifty million was not Richard’s biggest fear.
Bennett Industrial had an upcoming merger.
If the Plant Four records became public before the deal closed, Richard could lose control of the company.
“And there’s something else,” Mark said.
“My shares aren’t thirty-one percent anymore.”
I leaned closer.
“I bought more.”
My stomach dropped.
“Quietly.”
Mark smiled.
“Dad never noticed because he was too busy watching everyone he thought was weaker than him.”
The screen displayed the number.
MARK BENNETT VOTING INTEREST:
41.2%.
Then another line.
DANIEL BENNETT:
9.4%.
Combined:
50.6%.
I stopped breathing.
Mark and Daniel together controlled the company.
And Mark’s voting rights had not passed to me.
They had passed to someone else.
TRUSTEE:
May you like
EVELYN BENNETT.
Richard’s supposedly dead wife now controlled the deciding shares.
