Chapter 7 - DAY FIVE
Five days after the anniversary dinner, I woke to 152 missed calls.
Eighty-three from Daniel.
Thirty-one from Patricia.
Nineteen from Richard.
Eleven from Melissa.
Eight from numbers I didn’t recognize.
And one text.
Daniel:
PLEASE... UNDO WHAT YOU DID.
I stared at it from the conference room of Prescott Logistics.
At 9:00 a.m., the board meeting began.
Daniel sat across from me.
Richard was not allowed inside.
Neither was Patricia.
Melissa had retained separate counsel and agreed to cooperate with the internal investigation.
The employee trust representative sat to my right.
Nina sat behind me.
Marcus had provided a ninety-seven-page forensic report.
I had read every page.
At 9:14, the board received confirmation that Daniel had breached the operating agreement by pledging his interest without majority consent.
At 9:27, Marcus summarized $2.6 million in questionable related-party transactions.
At 9:41, counsel confirmed forged governance documents had been circulated to at least one lender.
At 10:03, Daniel was asked to leave the room while the board considered management action.
He looked at me.
“Claire.”
I said nothing.
“Please.”
Five days earlier, he had loved having an audience.
Now he wanted privacy.
“We can fix this.”
The employee trustee looked away.
Daniel’s voice dropped.
“You’re going to destroy eighty-three jobs because you’re mad at me.”
I almost admired the manipulation.
“No.”
I held his gaze.
“I’m protecting eighty-three jobs from you.”
Security escorted him out.
At 10:22, the board voted.
Daniel was suspended as CEO pending completion of investigations.
Interim operating authority transferred to the COO.
I declined the role.
I wasn’t trying to take Daniel’s desk.
I was trying to stop him from burning down the company.
At 10:46, Prescott’s primary lender agreed not to declare default, provided I maintained majority control and extraordinary transfers remained frozen.
At 11:12, Ridgeway sent a notice.
Daniel’s private loan was in default.
He had missed the payment.
They intended to enforce their rights.
Nina smiled for the first time all morning.
“Good.”
I frowned.
“Why good?”
“Because now they have to show us their hand.”
At 12:30, Thomas Ellison himself arrived.
He looked older than I remembered.
White hair.
Thin face.
Same dark eyes.
He stood in the conference-room doorway and looked at me for a long moment.
“You look like Robert.”
I wanted to hate him.
I had practiced hating him for years.
“Did you destroy my father’s company?”
“No.”
“Convenient answer.”
“I tried to save it.”
“From who?”
He looked through the glass wall toward the hallway where Daniel had been sitting.
“Richard Prescott.”
Nina closed the door.
Thomas opened a leather folder.
Inside were old bank statements.
My father’s brokerage had not collapsed because Thomas stole money.
Money had been siphoned into a company Richard controlled.
Thomas found it.
My father confronted Richard.
Richard threatened countersuits and personal guarantees.
Then my father made a choice.
“He settled?” I asked.
“Secretly.”
“For what?”
Thomas looked at me.
“Protection for you.”
My throat tightened.
My father agreed not to sue Richard immediately.
In return, Richard signed the contingent ownership agreement and deposited funds into a protected estate reserve.
The same reserve that somehow contributed $640,000 to Richard and Patricia’s Lake Ridge home decades later.
“But how could they access it?” I asked.
Thomas opened another document.
A trustee authorization.
My name was printed.
Signature forged.
Again.
But the witness signature wasn’t Melissa’s.
It was Daniel’s.
He had helped his parents access money from my father’s estate.
My husband hadn’t just stolen company funds.
He had reached backward into money my father left to protect me.
I stood so abruptly the chair rolled behind me.
“Where is he?”
Nina caught my arm.
“Claire.”
“Where is Daniel?”
Thomas answered quietly.
“He’s downstairs.”
I left the conference room.
Daniel stood in the lobby.
He saw my face.
Then the paper in my hand.
His eyes closed.
“You knew.”
“Claire—”
“You signed this.”
“I didn’t understand what account it was.”
“You signed my name.”
“Dad told me—”
“I don’t care what your father told you!”
The lobby went silent.
It was the first time I had raised my voice all week.
Daniel’s eyes filled.
“I was trying to keep them from exposing the debt.”
“You stole from a dead man.”
“He was your father.”
“That makes it worse.”
“I know.”
“No, Daniel.”
I held up the document.
“You still don’t.”
Then Thomas appeared behind me.
Daniel stared.
“What is he doing here?”
Thomas answered:
“Collecting what your father owes.”
Daniel went pale.
Thomas looked at me.
“But not from Prescott Logistics.”
I frowned.
“Then from what?”
He handed me one final document.
Richard Prescott had pledged something far more valuable than his son’s shares.
May you like
A property portfolio worth nearly forty million dollars.
And every property sat inside Patricia Prescott’s family trust.
