Chapter 8 - THE FREIGHT TRUCK
"Stall him!" I yelled into the phone, pressing the gas pedal harder. "Rebecca, do whatever you have to do. Do not let that truck leave the loading dock!"
"I'm trying, but—" The line went dead.
I broke every speed limit getting back to downtown Chicago. My mind was a whirlwind of rage and clarity. For twenty-five years, I had built this company alongside a man who used me, betrayed me, and ultimately destroyed the woman who loved us both.
Not anymore.
I pulled into the alleyway behind the Bennett Fine Furnishings headquarters. The massive steel doors of the loading dock were open. A white freight truck was idling, its engine rumbling loudly.
Charles was standing on the dock, yelling at two movers who were strapping my mother’s rocking chair into the back of the truck.
Rebecca was standing between Charles and the truck, holding her ground.
"Move, Rebecca!" Charles screamed, his face purple with rage. "You're fired! Get off my property!"
"It's not your property!" Rebecca shouted back.
I slammed the car into park and jumped out, Olivia right behind me.
"Stop!" I screamed, running up the ramp.
Charles whipped around. When he saw me, a look of pure, unadulterated panic flashed across his face.
"Get it in the truck! Now!" he yelled to the movers.
"If either of you touches that chair, I will personally see to it that you are charged with accessory to fraud and embezzlement!" I warned, my voice cutting through the noise of the engine.
The two movers froze. They looked at Charles, then at me, and slowly backed away from the chair.
"Margaret, you are having a hysterical breakdown," Charles said, trying to force a calm, condescending tone. "I'm just protecting our assets. The press is trying to ruin us."
"You ruined us," I said, stepping onto the dock. I walked past him, ignoring his presence entirely, and went straight to the rocking chair.
I ran my fingers over the right armrest. I found the carved rose. I found the tiny scratch Olivia had made when she was three.
I grabbed a heavy metal crowbar from a nearby toolbox on the dock.
"Margaret, stop!" Charles lunged toward me, but Rebecca stepped in his way, shoving him back hard enough that he stumbled.
I raised the crowbar and brought it down violently onto the right armrest of my mother's masterpiece.
The walnut splintered. Wood cracked and shattered, echoing like a gunshot in the alley.
I dropped the crowbar and pulled the broken pieces of wood away.
Inside the hollowed-out armrest was a tightly rolled cylinder of heavy parchment paper, sealed with red wax.
Charles fell to his knees on the concrete.
I pulled the parchment out and unrolled it. It was the original Articles of Incorporation for Bennett Fine Furnishings, dated twenty-five years ago.
And right there, in black and white, legally notarized, was the truth.
Owner and Sole Proprietor: Margaret Parker.
Silent Partner: Evelyn Parker.
Charles Bennett is an employee, entitled to zero equity, terminable at will.
He had never owned the company. He had hidden this document and forged a fake one decades ago.
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I looked down at my husband. He wasn't a CEO. He wasn't a visionary. He was a thief who had finally been caught.
And then, the wail of police sirens filled the alleyway.
