Chapter 7 - The Corporate Trap
The conference room at Blackwood Capital Partners was packed to capacity at 2:00 p.m. Julian Vance stood at the podium, surrounded by three corporate lawyers from the Vanguard Logistics group. The atmosphere was triumphant; they believed they had finally found the leverage required to break Richard Blackwood’s hold on the firm.
"Given the public broadcast this morning," Julian announced to the silent board, "the reputation of Blackwood Capital is under imminent threat. The moral turpitude clause is clear. We have a duty to our investors to install interim leadership while Mr. Blackwood resolves his domestic legal liabilities."
The double doors at the back of the room swung open.
Richard walked in, followed by Thomas Vance and Mrs. Wilson, who was still wearing her school uniform cardigan. Richard carried a large black leather case, which he placed heavily on the mahogany table.
"Richard," Julian said, his smile faltering slightly. "This is an internal board matter. You cannot bring outside witnesses into this chamber."
"I am the majority owner of this chamber, Julian," Richard said, opening the black case. Instead of corporate financial records, he pulled out the plastic bag of stale scraps he had found under Ethan's bed, dropping it onto the center of the polished table.
The board members stared at the moldy bread and stale pretzels sitting amidst their high-end tablets and water glasses.
"That is what my son was eating while I was out building this company for you," Richard said, his voice echoing off the glass walls. He pulled out Cassandra’s leather logbook and slammed it down beside the bag. "And this is the record of how it was done. Julian, your lawyers want to talk about moral turpitude? Let’s talk about how your firm funded Cassandra Vale’s lifestyle through our corporate marketing accounts while she was systematically starving an eight-year-old child."
Thomas Vance stepped forward, distributing copies of the logbook pages and the household invoices to every board member. "We have verified that Julian Vance approved two hundred thousand dollars in 'consulting fees' to Cassandra’s PR firm over the last twelve months—fees that were used to bury the school’s complaints and ensure Richard never saw the reports from St. Jude Academy."
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Julian’s face went from pale to a deep, mottled red. "That’s an administrative oversight! We handle thousands of vendors—"
"You handled the woman who was hurting my son so you could use her to force me into executive burnout," Richard said, stepping toward Julian until the CFO was pressed back against the podium. "You wanted the company, Julian? You can have the shell of it. Because as of two minutes ago, I filed a disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission withdrawing my fifty-two percent share from the Vanguard merger. The deal is dead. And you are fired."
