Chapter 4

Through the heavy double doors, I could hear Yvonne sobbing.

"Chris, I was just trying to protect the company yesterday. I was worried about a walkout. So I asked her to settle. And she hit me. And then she had me fired."

"I'd like to see them try." Christopher's hand slammed the table inside. "Starting today, you're the General Manager of Whitfield Group's Fashion Division. Let's see anyone push you around. I'll find that woman and make her get on her knees and apologize, sooner or later."

"This appointment goes through today. Anyone votes against, you can find another company."

The conference room went silent enough to hear the air conditioning. Not one director answered.

He thought I was going to clean it up for him like always.

I pushed the doors open.

My heels hit the hardwood. Click. Click. Click. Like I was counting down for him.

A dozen stunned faces snapped up. Christopher froze in place. Yvonne was caught with a tissue half-raised, half-forgotten.

I walked over and dropped last night's medical report, still creased from being held, in the center of the long table.

"I oppose."

Two bodyguards came in behind me. I rounded the table and walked toward the head of the U.

Christopher's face went white. His body started to stand up on instinct. Then he glanced at the weeping Yvonne in his arms and pulled himself back, just staring at me, breathing half a beat faster than usual.

When Yvonne saw me coming toward her, she didn't shrink back. She pushed deeper into Christopher's arms and pitched her crying louder. "Chris, that's the woman. That's who hurt me yesterday."

She glanced up at me. Her eyes were full of malice and triumph. As if to say, look, he still chooses me.

I didn't even bother looking at her properly.

"You said a minute ago you were going to make whoever hurt her get on her knees and apologize," I said directly to Christopher. "Were you talking about me?"

Christopher's throat moved. His mouth opened. Nothing came out.

He'd been afraid of one person his whole life. Me. Inside the family and out, he knew exactly who actually called the shots in the Whitfield house.

The directors traded looks and started staring down at their files.

A middle-aged director halfway down the table cleared his throat and stood. "Eleanor, barging into the boardroom like this is a little,"

The two bodyguards behind me. One shifted half a step left. One shifted half a step right.

The rest of his sentence died in his throat. He sat back down.

I walked up to Christopher's chair. "Care to explain?"

Christopher stood up, grabbed my arm, and pulled me into the corner of the room by the window.

"Ellie, what are you trying to do? You won't be happy until I'm humiliated in front of the entire board?"

"Yvonne didn't know who you were. She stopped a customer who hadn't paid. She was protecting the company. Hit you? She's just got a temper. It wasn't personal."

I looked at him.

After being beaten with a metal hanger until my fingers wouldn't bend. After being slammed into a mirror twice and cut up. After being pinned to the carpet on my knees and shaken down for one point six million dollars. He was asking me to back off and let her go.

"You knew who she was hitting."

He didn't answer.

"You knew you put that flag on my file."

Still nothing.

"You knew all of it. And you still spent last night locking down a GM seat for her."

"Chris," I said. "It's not that you didn't know. You just didn't think I'd actually do anything about it."

Whatever was left of his composure broke clean apart.

I laughed.

Sirens were coming up from the street. Closer and closer.

The double doors opened again. Four officers walked in. Uniforms crisp. Not a flicker of expression.

The one in front scanned the room and his eyes landed on me. "Ms. Eleanor Whitfield filed the report?"

I nodded.

He pulled a document out of his jacket and turned to Yvonne, still curled against Christopher.

"Yvonne Carter. You're under arrest for assault and extortion. Cooperate, please."

Yvonne's face went white. She let out a scream and clung to Christopher's arm. "Chris, help me. I'm not going."

Christopher's face cycled through colors. His girlfriend being arrested in front of a dozen directors. It was beyond losing face. It was a kind of humiliation that didn't have a clean recovery.

He clenched his jaw and forced out, "Eleanor. Do you really have to take it this far?"

I just looked at him. I didn't say anything.

He took a breath and turned to the officer. "Officer, this is a misunderstanding. It's an internal company matter. We can handle it ourselves."

Then he turned back to me. His voice dropped a full octave. He was practically begging.

"Ellie. Just give me this one."

He thought I was going to cave like I always had. He thought twenty years of being his sister still meant I'd back down.

Yesterday's fitting room. The hanger. The mirror. The carpet. His text to Yvonne about how I spoiled him, how this wouldn't blow up.

Whatever credit he had with me, he'd burned through himself.

I turned to the officer. One word at a time.

"Officer. This isn't a misunderstanding. The hospital has a complete medical assessment of my injuries. She extorted me for one point six million dollars. There's surveillance footage. Process this through the proper legal channels. Now."

Every word I said, his face dropped another inch. The pleading turned to shock. The shock turned to humiliated rage.

The officers stopped paying attention to him.

Two of them stepped forward. Click. The cuffs went on Yvonne's wrists.

She started thrashing like she'd lost her mind, screaming the whole way. "Get off me! My boyfriend is the second son of Whitfield Group. He's Christopher Whitfield. He was making me GM of the Fashion Division today. You can't do this to me."

Her screams got dragged out of the conference room, the sound trailing further and further away, until that heavy door cut them off.

Christopher stood there frozen by his board chair, like a statue no one had bothered to dust. The directors were watching him with a look that didn't have a single simple thing in it.

The face he cared about most. I'd ripped it open in front of a dozen senior executives.

I didn't bother with him. I turned to my assistant.

"Pull his motion out of the system. Tell legal: every external contract for the Fashion Division now requires my signature to take effect, starting now."