Chapter 8 - The Decision That Put the Company in Danger
Linda still owned seventy percent of Whitmore.
Only she could authorize an emergency challenge to the domain transfer and remove Ethan as operating manager.
She refused to sign anything I sent through her attorney.
She believed stopping Ethan would hand control to me.
We could have waited until the fraud investigation produced stronger findings.
By then, the customer list and online identity might be gone.
James and the outside accountant advised me to notify Whitmore’s bank, commercial insurer, and largest secured creditor about the unauthorized transfer of company assets.
Doing so would protect evidence.
It might also freeze every company account and force an immediate shutdown.
Thirty-two employees, eleven unfinished kitchens, and dozens of prepaid customers depended on the decision.
I spent one night reading payroll reports and supplier claims at Claire’s dining table while my unborn daughter shifted beneath my ribs.
At six the next morning, I signed the disclosures.
The bank suspended Ethan’s authority over the operating accounts pending an ownership review. The domain registrar blocked the transfer. The insurer appointed forensic auditors.
Whitmore could no longer continue normal operations.
Employees were sent home with partial pay.
Customers received notices that construction schedules were delayed.
Ethan posted a video accusing me of destroying a forty-year-old Ohio business because his mother refused to obey me.
He showed a photograph of my injured leg and claimed I had staged the assault to gain sympathy.
Linda sat beside him in the video.
Her face looked rigid.
She repeated that I had threatened the family and insulted her in her own home.
But when Ethan said the company had been financially healthy before I interfered, Linda looked at him.
Only for a second.
It was the first visible crack in their alliance.
That afternoon, the bank showed Linda the loan application secured by her home.
The signature was hers.
The email approving it came from an address Ethan created without her knowledge.
If the final credit line had been funded, her house would have guaranteed the debt.
Linda’s attorney called Monica.
For the first time since the attack, Linda was willing to meet.
May you like
She had one condition.
She wanted me to explain why Ethan had needed her to hit me.
