Chapter 5 - The Dinner of False Pretenses
The phone on my desk buzzed relentlessly.
It was my mother, Eleanor. She had called fourteen times since noon. When I finally pressed the answer button and brought the receiver to my ear, her frantic, weeping voice flooded the line.
"Leo! Oh, thank God you answered!" she sobbed. "What is going on? Your father came home in a complete panic. There are men in suits at the company headquarters locking the executive files! Ethan’s car was taken! What did you tell your grandfather?"
I listened to her hysteria without moving an inch. For my entire life, Eleanor had been the peacemaker who only made peace by sacrificing me. Whenever Ethan broke something, I took the blame. Whenever Ethan failed a class, I was forced to tutor him until dawn. When my father struck me at the Thanksgiving table, she had buried her face in her hands and wept for her own discomfort, never once standing up to check if her eldest son was bleeding.
"Mom," I said coldly, "Ethan hired criminals to attack my house. He stood outside my window and watched them shatter my home."
"He was desperate, Leo!" she blurted out, her defense of him coming so instinctively it was sickening. "Ethan made a mistake with some bad people! Robert was going to fix it! Why couldn't you just give him the house? We would have helped you buy another one eventually! You're the older brother! You're supposed to protect him!"
The breath left my lungs in a sharp, bitter laugh. "Protect him from the consequences of his own crimes? While he terrorizes me?"
"You're tearing this family apart!" she wailed. "Robert is beside himself! His blood pressure is through the roof! Please, Leo, you have to fix this with Walter. Walter only listens to you. Tell him it was a misunderstanding. Tell him Robert didn't do anything wrong!"
"Robert slapped me in front of twelve people, Mom. And you sat there and watched."
Silence hung on the line for five agonizing seconds.
"He's your father," she whispered, her voice hardening with that familiar, manipulative venom. "A father has the right to discipline his child."
"I am thirty-two years old," I replied. "And tomorrow night, you will see what actual discipline looks like."
Before she could scream another word, I disconnected the call and blocked her number.
Across from me, Harrison Vance laid out an impeccably tailored midnight-blue tuxedo on the mahogany table. Beside it lay a gold lapel pin in the shape of an anchor—the historic seal of the original Carter Maritime & Logistics Company founded by Walter fifty years ago.
"The board of directors has been briefed under strict nondisclosure," Vance informed me, his eyes gleaming with anticipation. "Robert has spent the entire afternoon attempting to access the trust’s contingency reserves to pay off Ethan’s bookies before the gala tomorrow. He failed. Every terminal in his office has been restricted to guest access."
"How is he handling it?" I asked.
"He believes there is a system glitch," Vance smirked. "He called an emergency meeting with the board for tomorrow night during the gala, convinced he can use the event to pressure the board into voting him full unilateral authority over the trust. He has no idea that the board no longer answers to him."
"And the bookies?"
"Marcus Drake received a formal visit from our private security team this afternoon," Vance said, leaning in. "When presented with the choice between federal extortion charges or cooperating fully with Walter Carter, Mr. Drake proved remarkably sensible. He will be outside the country club tomorrow night, waiting for Ethan to hand over the money he promised."
I looked at the tuxedo, then at my reflection in the dark window. The bruised welt on my cheek had faded to a dull, faint purple. But the resolve inside my chest had solidified into diamond.
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"Grandpa wants me to walk in through the front door," I said quietly.
"No, Leo," Walter’s voice boomed from the study doorway as he stepped inside, leaning lightly on his silver-headed cane. "You will not just walk in through the front door. You will walk in as the owner of every brick, every glass, and every life in that room."
