Chapter 13 - The Boardroom
Ethan returned to Brooks Global without the disguise.
But he carried Eli with him.
Not the name.
The lesson.
Forty floors above Chicago, executives who once ignored him as a janitor now stood when he entered.
He hated the contrast.
Sophia came too.
Not as Ethan’s girlfriend.
They still were not that.
She came because her trust held twelve percent.
Victor arrived with attorneys.
Gabriel Mercer appeared publicly for the first time in decades.
Ethan saw himself in him.
Same eyes.
Same controlled posture.
He felt nothing resembling reunion.
Gabriel smiled.
“My son.”
Ethan answered:
“Mr. Mercer.”
The smile disappeared.
Good.
The board meeting began.
Gabriel presented evidence that his software architecture had formed the basis of Brooks Global.
Valid.
Thomas had used it.
Valid.
Victor had facilitated secret payments.
Valid.
But then Nathan presented Rachel’s ledger.
Gabriel’s face changed.
Because Rachel had documented something he never expected anyone to find.
Gabriel had not merely accepted Thomas’s payments.
He had demanded them.
For years.
Whenever Thomas threatened to stop paying, Gabriel threatened to reveal Ethan’s paternity publicly.
Ethan stared at him.
“You blackmailed the man who raised me.”
Gabriel remained calm.
“He stole my company.”
“So you sold access to your son?”
“I financed my survival.”
“You attended my father’s funeral from behind a tree.”
“He wasn’t your father.”
Ethan stood.
“He raised me.”
The room went silent.
Gabriel’s expression hardened.
“That sentimentality is why Brooks Global needs me.”
Sophia looked disgusted.
Then Victor laughed.
Everyone turned.
“You still think Gabriel is the mastermind?”
Gabriel’s eyes sharpened.
“Careful.”
Victor smiled.
“No.”
“I’m done being careful.”
He opened a folder.
Rachel’s crash investigation.
A payment had been made forty-eight hours before her death to the mechanic who serviced her car.
The account belonged to Meridian North.
Michael Reed’s supposedly forged company.
Gabriel stared.
Victor continued:
“Rachel discovered who authorized it.”
Ethan’s pulse hammered.
“Who?”
Victor looked directly at Gabriel.
“Not me.”
Gabriel stood.
“This meeting is over.”
Federal investigators blocked the doors.
Victor smiled wider.
“Sit down.”
Then Sophia noticed something in the payment authorization.
Initials.
T.B.
Thomas Brooks.
Ethan stared.
The father who raised him had apparently paid the mechanic connected to Rachel’s crash.
“No.”
Victor whispered:
“Rachel was leaving him.”
Ethan shook his head.
Victor continued:
“She was taking you.”
Gabriel watched silently.
“She was exposing the company.”
Thomas had motive.
But he had loved Rachel.
Hadn’t he?
Ethan no longer knew what love looked like inside this family.
Then Nathan received an encrypted message.
One restored audio file from Rachel’s security recording.
They played it.
Rachel’s voice filled the boardroom.
“Thomas knows about the brakes.”
Ethan closed his eyes.
Then Rachel continued:
“He’s trying to stop whoever ordered it.”
Ethan looked up.
Thomas had not ordered the sabotage.
The initials were forged.
Rachel named the person.
But before the name played, the boardroom doors opened.
Evelyn Hale entered in a wheelchair.
She held a hospital admission file.
“I know whose handwriting forged Thomas’s initials.”
Victor went pale.
Gabriel did too.
May you like
But Evelyn was looking at neither man.
She was looking at Nathan.
