Chapter 17 - The Final Board Meeting
One week after the arrests, the company's emergency board meeting was held in the grand ballroom of the very hotel where Daniel had celebrated becoming CEO five years earlier. The room was packed with anxious executives, nervous investors, and a legion of corporate lawyers.
Because his high-priced defense attorneys were aggressively fighting my legal petition to permanently remove him, Daniel was permitted to attend the meeting via a secure video feed from the county jail.
When the giant screens in the ballroom flickered to life, Daniel appeared. He was wearing an oversized orange jumpsuit, sitting in a drab cinderblock room. Yet, incredibly, he still wore his arrogance like a crown. He sat up straight, glaring at the camera as if he were still in charge.
"This is an illegal coup," Daniel declared immediately, his voice booming through the ballroom's sound system. "My estranged wife fabricated this ridiculous evidence because she wants total control of the company. She failed our children with her negligence, and now, to cover her own guilt, she is framing me."
A few of the older board members, men who had drank scotch with Daniel for years, murmured in uneasy agreement. They wanted to believe the man they knew, rather than the horrific truth.
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I stood up from my seat at the back of the room and walked slowly to the stage. I didn't wear mourning black this time. I wore a sharp, tailored business suit. I took the podium, looking up at Daniel's massive face on the screen.
"Let's look at the facts," I said to the room.
