Chapter 5 - THE FOUR-POINT-EIGHT MILLION DOLLARS
Naomi Park, Daniel’s outside attorney, found Redline Advisory before sunrise.
Sophia’s company.
Registered eighteen months earlier.
Consulting agreement with NorthBridge.
Success fee:
$4.8 million.
Payable if the Brooks Meridian asset sale closed.
Daniel stared.
Michael did not know.
At least his face suggested he did not.
“Sophia has a fee?”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“Integration strategy.”
Michael looked sick.
Sophia entered the conference room thirty minutes later with counsel.
Daniel slid the contract across the table.
“You forgot to mention this.”
Sophia read it.
Then looked at Michael.
“I didn’t forget.”
Michael’s face changed.
“You knew?”
“I was going to tell you after closing.”
Daniel almost smiled.
Same phrase every conspirator used.
After.
Sophia continued.
“Redline has worked on NorthBridge integration for two years.”
“Four-point-eight million dollars,” Michael said.
“I earned it.”
Possible.
She had introduced NorthBridge executives.
Coordinated labor modeling.
Worked with hotel vendors.
Her company had real invoices.
Daniel asked:
“Why is payment contingent on closing?”
“Because that is how success fees work.”
Strong answer.
Then:
“Why did you try to remove me twelve hours before the vote?”
Sophia looked at him.
“You assume everything is about you.”
Daniel laughed.
Michael did not.
Sophia turned to her husband.
“The company has $170 million in debt maturities over eighteen months. NorthBridge solves that.”
“By selling Mother’s hotel portfolio.”
“By saving six hundred jobs.”
Michael looked down.
There.
The deal was not fake.
The crisis was real.
Daniel opposed it partly because the hotels had belonged to their late mother.
Sophia knew that.
She used it.
Then Naomi placed another document down.
Redline’s internal financial forecast.
One line:
Trust deadlock must be resolved prior to closing.
Next:
Temporary trustee concentration sufficient.
Michael read it twice.
Sophia’s lawyer interrupted.
“Generic scenario modeling.”
Daniel looked at Sophia.
“Who taught you the phrase temporary trustee concentration?”
She did not answer.
Charles Keene entered behind them.
Daniel watched Sophia glance at him.
Very quickly.
May you like
Too quickly.
And suddenly Daniel knew which relationship needed investigating next.
