Chapter 7: What Furniture Does
My father was waiting outside the facility in the black sedan.
I got in.
He looked at me once, read whatever was in my face, and nodded.
"Done?" he said.
"Done," I said.
He told the driver to go.
We moved through the city in silence for a while.
The morning had turned grey, low cloud pressing down over the buildings, and I watched it through the window and felt the particular exhaustion that comes not from effort but from the end of effort.
"I need to ask you something," I said.
"Ask."
"Blackthorn Manor.
The estate." I turned from the window.
"It was built with money from my trust.
Nathan restructured the financing eighteen months after we married.
He moved the original investment through three holding companies and by the time the paperwork settled, the manor was listed as an Ashford Global asset." I paused.
"I want it back."
My father was quiet for a moment.
"Your legal team filed that claim four weeks ago," he said.
"The asset freeze covers it.
When the fraud case concludes, the manor reverts to you as the primary defrauded party."
"And if Nathan contests it?"
"He won't.
His attorney knows the documentation is complete." My father looked at me.
"What will you do with it?"
I thought about the grand hall.
The black stone floor.
The chandelier.
"I don't know yet," I said.
"But it won't look the way it looks now."
He nodded.
We drove.
Then he said, "There's something I need to tell you."
His voice had changed slightly.
Not much.
Just enough.
I looked at him.
"When you were in the hospital," he said.
"After the staircase.
Three days." He stopped.
Started again.
"I sat outside that hospital for two of those three days.
I did not come in.
You had asked me not to β you said if I appeared, Nathan would know something had changed.
So I stayed outside." He looked at his hands.
"That was the hardest thing I have done in thirty years."
The car moved through a junction.
"I know you were there," I said.
He looked up.
"One of the nurses told me," I said.
"She said there was a silver-haired man in the car park who hadn't moved in twelve hours.
She thought he might need medical attention." I paused.
"I told her he was fine.
That he just needed to be close."
My father looked at me for a long moment.
Then he looked away.
His jaw worked once.
"You should have called me in," he said.
"I know," I said.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry," he said.
His voice was rough at the edges.
"Just don't do it again."
"I won't," I said.
He put his hand over mine on the seat between us.
We didn't say anything else for a while.
We didn't need to.
---
Three days later, I was called to a meeting I had not requested.
It was Nathan's board of directors β or what remained of them.
Seven people around a long table.
The chairman, a man named Gerald Forsythe who had sent Nathan that first account suspension notification, sat at the head.
He stood when I came in.
"Mrs.
Ashford," he said.
"Ms.
Vale," I said.
He nodded.
"Ms.
Vale.
Thank you for coming." He gestured to a chair.
"We have a proposal we'd like to discuss."
I sat down.
Forsythe looked at the others, then back at me.
"Ashford Global Logistics controls contracts across three continents," he said.
"Those contracts don't disappear because the founder is facing federal charges.
There are eleven thousand employees.
There are clients.
There are obligations." He folded his hands.
"The company needs leadership.
Transitional leadership, while the legal situation resolves."
I looked at him.
"You're asking me to run it," I said.
"We're asking you to consider it," he said.
"You have financial intelligence background through your family.
You understand the company's structure better than anyone currently available.
And franklyβ" He paused.
"You are the reason the fraud was exposed.
The board believes the clients and partners need to see that the person at the helm is someone the company wronged, not someone who participated in wronging it."
I looked around the table.
Seven faces.
Some uncomfortable.
Some hopeful.
One β a woman at the far end, younger than the others β watching me with an expression that was simply direct.
"Interim CEO," I said.
"Not permanent."
"Correct," Forsythe said.
"I choose my own team.
I have full authority over personnel decisions during the interim period."
"Agreed."
"And Marcus Webb does not return to this company in any capacity."
Forsythe nodded.
"Understood."
I looked at the woman at the far end of the table.
She gave me a small nod.
I turned back to Forsythe.
"I'll give you my answer in forty-eight hours," I said.
I stood.
The room was quiet as I walked to the door.
May you like
Behind me, I heard Gerald Forsythe exhale β a long, slow breath, like a man who had been holding it for some time.
I did not smile until I was in the corridor.
