Chapter 7 - The Boardroom Ambush
At seven forty-five in the morning,
the executive lobby on the forty-second floor of the Northgate Tower was suffocated by silence.
Security guards stood near the frosted glass elevators,
their expressions unusually stiff,
eyes darting nervously as staff members whispered behind half-closed cubicle doors.
News monitors on the walls ran silent tickers,
flashing Northgate’s plummeting ticker symbol in glaring red numbers:
minus twenty-two percent.
Inside the boardroom,
the long glass conference table was surrounded by ten members of the board of directors.
They were anxious,
confused,
and speaking in hushed,
frantic tones about margin calls and emergency liquidity.
Jerome sat at the head of the table.
He had changed into a navy blue bespoke suit,
his silver hair slicked back with water,
trying desperately to project the image of an executive who was still in command of his destiny.
Yet,
the deep purple shadows under his bloodshot eyes and the nervous twitch in his left eyelid told a completely different story.
“Gentlemen,
please,”
Jerome said,
raising his hands to quell the murmuring around the table.
“The rumors in the morning press are entirely fabricated.
The bridge financing with Drayton Capital and Vanguard Ridge remains completely viable.
We experienced a minor scheduling delay during our dinner last night,
nothing more.
I have already scheduled a follow-up conference call with Evelyn Cross for ten o'clock.”
The heavy double doors of the boardroom swung open with an authoritative click.
“Evelyn Cross will not be taking your call,
Jerome,”
I said,
stepping over the threshold.
The entire boardroom went dead silent.
I was dressed in a tailored ivory wool suit,
my hair swept up into an austere chignon,
wearing simple pearl earrings that my mother had given me.
The faint mark on my left cheek was hidden beneath sheer makeup,
leaving my face looking as composed and unyielding as polished marble.
Behind me walked Cornelius Hail,
flanked by Sarah Sterling and two uniformed federal process servers carrying heavy leather portfolios.
Jerome’s face drained of every drop of color.
He stood up abruptly,
knocking his leather chair back against the glass wall.
“Leona,”
he hissed,
his voice trembling with suppressed fury.
“This is an executive meeting of the board of directors.
You have no authorization to interrupt our agenda.
Security,
remove these people immediately!”
None of the two security guards at the door moved an inch.
Instead,
they kept their eyes fixed forward,
standing at rigid attention.
“The security team reports to corporate governance,
Mister Chase,”
Sarah Sterling announced,
stepping forward and placing a stack of blue-backed legal documents in front of each board member.
“And as of seven thirty this morning,
corporate governance has placed you on administrative leave pending an investigation into felony corporate embezzlement.”
Gasps echoed around the table.
Henry Vance,
the seventy-year-old lead independent director,
pushed his reading glasses up his nose and stared at the documents in shock.
“Embezzlement?”
Henry gasped,
looking from Sarah to Jerome.
“Jerome,
what is the meaning of this?
What are these transfers to Asteria Global?”
Jerome gripped the back of his chair so tightly that his knuckles cracked.
“It’s a lie!”
he shouted,
his voice echoing shrilly off the floor-to-ceiling windows.
“She is orchestrating a personal vendetta because we had a domestic dispute last night!
She is trying to seize control of my company through extortion!”
I walked slowly down the length of the table,
my heels clicking with steady,
rhythmic precision on the hardwood floor.
I stopped directly across from him,
looking into the eyes of the man I had lived with for twenty years,
seeing only the hollow shell of a fraud who had mistaken borrowed wealth for personal greatness.
“It was never your company,
Jerome,”
I said,
my voice quiet,
resonant,
and terrifyingly calm.
“You own nine percent of the voting equity,
which was pledged as collateral for a private family loan that went into default at midnight.
May you like
I hold sixty-one percent of the voting shares.
And I have just called for an immediate vote of no confidence.”
