Mason Carter Arrives
Chapter 08 - Mason Carter Arrives
Mason Carter entered through the private elevator without an entourage.
He was sixty-four, silver-haired, tall despite age, wearing a dark overcoat over his gala tuxedo. The city knew him as a patient negotiator who could wait out hostile boards and collapsing markets. Lena knew the man beneath that control: the father who sent orchids when he should have called, who remembered every school play but attended only one, who loved her with the clumsy force of a man trained to acquire rather than apologize.
When he saw her cheek, his composure cracked.
Not loudly. His hand closed once at his side.
Grant began speaking immediately. “Mr. Carter, I had no idea—”
Mason walked past him.
He stopped several feet from Lena. “May I sit?”
She nodded.
He lowered himself onto the edge of the sofa opposite her. For a moment neither spoke. Six years of distance sat between them beside the ice pack and scattered flowers.
“I am sorry,” Mason said.
Lena’s eyes filled. “For which part?”
“All the parts where I mistook distance for respect.”
That answer was better than she expected and not enough.
Grant tried again. “She hid who she was from me.”
Mason looked over his shoulder. “And you believe ignorance excuses assault and fraud?”
“I did not assault her.”
Sienna spoke from the windows. “You shoved her.”
Grant turned on her. “You came here willingly.”
“I came because you lied.”
Mason stood. The room seemed to rise with him.
“You wanted the chief operating officer position,” he said to Grant. “Tomorrow the board will receive evidence that you forged the signature of a shareholder, coerced my daughter, and used company personnel to conceal an affair.”
Grant’s confidence finally broke. “You can’t destroy my life because she called you.”
Mason’s voice remained calm. “No. You destroyed it before she called. The call merely brought witnesses.”
Lena watched Grant absorb the distinction.
Mason turned back to her.
“What happens next is your choice.”
She studied his face, searching for the old command hidden inside the promise.
May you like
This time, she found none.
“Then take me to the hospital,” she said. “After that, we go to the board.”
