Chapter 3 - THE FOUR-MONTH PERFORMANCE
Solomon agreed to speak with Audrey only through their attorneys present.
She hated that.
It also prevented the conversation from becoming another shouting match.
They met in a conference room.
Audrey placed the Mercer separation letter on the table.
“Four months.”
Solomon looked at it.
“Yes.”
“You dressed for work every morning.”
“Yes.”
“Where did you go?”
“Library. Coffee shops. Interviews. Sometimes a coworking space.”
“You came home and told Theo about meetings.”
“I had interviews.”
“You said Mercer.”
Solomon looked down.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He took a long breath.
“Because I thought I would replace the job before you needed to know.”
“You mean before I found out.”
“I had sixteen weeks of severance.”
That explained why the accounts looked normal.
“I thought I could solve it in six weeks,” he said. “Then I kept going.”
Each new morning had made yesterday’s lie harder to confess.
Audrey asked about the management review.
Solomon’s attorney interrupted.
“Employment findings are disputed.”
Audrey looked at Solomon.
“Then dispute them.”
He did.
Mercer had rolled out a warehouse automation program. Solomon delayed one site over readiness concerns while leadership wanted a quarter-end launch.
After review, Mercer concluded he had allowed inconsistent reporting and failed to escalate delays clearly enough.
“I didn’t falsify anything,” Solomon said.
“They called it insufficient transparency.”
Audrey almost laughed at the phrase.
Then he told her about Hartwell.
A recruiter contacted him six weeks after Mercer.
Two interviews became four.
Hartwell offered more money than Mercer.
But the job was in Charlotte.
Audrey asked:
“When were you going to tell me?”
“Once the written offer cleared.”
“It cleared two weeks ago.”
“I was going to tell you Friday.”
“Why Friday?”
“Because the relocation vendor was coming Monday.”
Audrey stared.
“Coming where?”
“To appraise the house.”
“Our house?”
“Yes.”
“You scheduled an appraisal on my home without telling me?”
“It’s preliminary.”
“Do they think we’re selling?”
Solomon hesitated.
“They think we’re relocating.”
Audrey’s anger turned cold.
“Anything else?”
“No.”
She knew immediately there was more.
At home that night, she searched the desk.
Under a stack of printer paper was a Hartwell relocation checklist.
One line had already been checked:
SCHOOL TRANSITION — INITIATED.
Theo was five.
Kindergarten started in two months.
Audrey clicked the portal link.
A private elementary school in Charlotte had an application under Theo’s name.
Parent 1:
Solomon Cole.
Parent 2:
Audrey Cole.
Status:
INTERVIEW WAIVED — CORPORATE RELOCATION.
Audrey had never applied.
Then she saw the emergency contact.
Not her.
A name she did not recognize:
JAMES COLE.
Relationship:
GRANDFATHER.
May you like
Solomon’s father had been dead for six years.
So who had entered a dead man as Theo’s emergency contact?
