Chapter 6 - The Gathering Storm
By Wednesday afternoon, Derek’s world had turned into a smoking crater. The news of his immediate termination with cause spread through the central Ohio insurance network like wildfire. In corporate circles, an executive fired for gross misconduct and expense fraud doesn’t get another six-figure job; they become an untouchable pariah.
Meanwhile, Conrad Holloway’s paper empire was unraveling at matching speed. Deprived of the ability to borrow against Derek’s supposed corporate prestige, Conrad’s creditors began circling. Two private investors in his boutique consulting firm filed emergency petitions in county court to freeze his commercial accounts, citing suspicious asset transfers.
I was back in my shop, underneath the lift inspecting the undercarriage of a customer’s farm truck, when the squeal of tires outside signaled another arrival.
I rolled out from under the chassis on my mechanic’s creeper, wiped my hands on an oily rag, and stood up. Conrad Holloway was marching through the wide garage doors, looking completely unhinged. The expensive camel-hair coat he loved to show off had a button missing, and his gray hair was windblown and disheveled.
“Miller!” Conrad roared, ignoring Toby, who stepped forward with a heavy iron tire iron in his hand. “You call off your attack dogs right now!”
“Toby, go take lunch,” I said calmly, setting my rag on the tool chest.
Toby hesitated, looking at Conrad’s trembling hands. “You sure, Harold?”
“I’m sure. Take thirty minutes.”
Once Toby had stepped out through the rear exit, I stood beside my heavy steel workbench, resting my knuckles against the cold metal. Conrad stopped ten feet away, breathing heavily, his face purple with rage.
“You’re destroying my family!” Conrad spat, his finger shaking as he pointed it at me. “Derek has been blacklisted across the entire state! Melissa took a locksmith to their house yesterday while he was out and changed the deadbolts! She served him with divorce papers this morning demanding full equitable division and legal fees! And now my bank is auditing my secondary investment line because of the cross-guarantees you cancelled!”
“Sounds like a rough week, Conrad,” I said without a trace of emotion.
“You vindictive, greasy grease-monkey!” Conrad screamed, taking two aggressive steps toward me. “All this because of a chair? Because my boy played a harmless prank on you at Thanksgiving? You’re an arrogant, spiteful old peasant!”
“It was never about the chair, Conrad,” I said, stepping around the workbench so there was nothing between us. I stood a full three inches taller than him, built by forty years of hauling truck transmissions and swinging twelve-pound sledgehammers. Conrad stopped in his tracks, suddenly realizing he wasn’t talking to a junior clerk in a boardroom.
“The chair was just the moment you showed me who you really were,” I continued, my voice dropping into a low, gravelly register. “You and your son thought that because I work with my hands, because I wear denim and have dirt in the creases of my skin, that I was stupid. You thought I was an ATM that existed solely to fund your illusions of grandeur.”
“We are respectable people!” Conrad sputtered, though his voice cracked slightly.
“Respectable people pay their debts, Conrad. Respectable people don’t steal from an old man’s daughter. And respectable men don’t laugh when a sixty-four-year-old grandfather gets dumped onto a hardwood floor.”
I reached into my pocket, pulled out a certified legal document, and tossed it onto the hood of a nearby sedan. It landed with a dry slap.
“What’s that?” Conrad asked warily.
“That’s an eviction notice for your consulting office on Market Street,” I told him. “You didn’t know the building’s master deed was held by the Buckeye Commercial Real Estate Trust, did you? Well, I bought twenty percent of that trust eight years ago, and last night I exercised my rights as managing trustee to terminate non-paying commercial leases. You have five business days to clear out your mahogany desk and your leased espresso machine before the county bailiff puts your files on the sidewalk.”
May you like
Conrad looked at the paper, then looked at me. The color drained from his face, leaving behind the hollow, sunken features of a broken con man. For the first time since I had met him, Conrad Holloway had nothing to say.
“Get off my property,” I said softly. “Before I call the sheriff again.”
