Chapter 5 - The Peterson Panic
By Friday afternoon, panic at Peterson Holdings had escalated from a manageable corporate fire into a raging, uncontrollable wildfire.
Frank Peterson’s opulent corner office on the fortieth floor of the Peterson Tower looked less like a corporate headquarters and more like a crime scene. Piles of financial ledgers littered the walnut desk, empty crystal tumblers sat on the credenza, and Frank himself was pacing the Persian rug, his face mottled red with apoplectic rage.
Carol and Megan had arrived uninvited forty-five minutes earlier, turning the executive waiting room into a stage for their hysterical outrage.
“I don't care what the lawyers say!” Carol shrieked, bursting through Frank’s double doors without knocking, her designer coat clutched around her shoulders. “Call the police! Have her arrested for corporate sabotage! She locked our personal accounts! I couldn't even pay for my florist appointment for the winter gala tomorrow!”
“Mom, shut up!” Frank roared back, slamming his hand onto the desk so hard the silver letter opener bounced. “Do you think I care about flowers right now? The bank just called! They’re calling in our primary line of credit on the Schaumburg development because the independent forensic audit triggered an automatic default clause!”
Megan collapsed into a leather armchair, dabbing at her dry eyes with a monogrammed handkerchief. “This is all because of that brat! If Chloe hadn't made such a dramatic, hysterical scene over a simple little slap—”
Frank spun around, pointing a shaking finger directly at his daughter. “If you hadn't lost your temper and hit a five-year-old child like a barbarian, none of this would be happening!”
“Dad!” Megan gasped, her mouth dropping open in betrayal. “You’re blaming me?”
“I’m blaming both of you!” Frank yelled, his voice cracking. “Do you have any idea who Chloe is? I thought she was just some quiet scholarship girl from the Midwest who got lucky marrying Mark. I didn't bother looking at her resume! Her firm handles federal-level white-collar fraud investigations and corporate restructuring! She didn't just lock our accounts—she legally mapped out every single internal transfer we made over the last five years and handed it directly to the Illinois Attorney General on a silver platter!”
The office went dead silent.
Carol sank slowly onto the sofa, the color draining entirely from her powdered face. “Federal... federal investigation? But we’re the Petersons. People like us don't get investigated.”
“People like us do when we commit grand larceny and tax evasion to fund our country club lifestyles!” Frank shouted, sinking heavily into his leather executive chair, looking suddenly ancient and defeated.
The door opened slowly, and Mark walked in. He looked shell-shocked, holding a cardboard box containing his desk personal items—a framed photo of our wedding (which he had face-turned downward), a few coffee mugs, and a stapler.
Frank looked up at his son, his eyes wide with desperate pleading. “Mark. You talked to her, right? You’re her husband. You can fix this. Tell her we’ll apologize. Tell her Megan will write a nice little card to Lily. We can drop the lawsuits, sweep this under the rug—”
Mark stared at his father with a look of hollow, bitter emptiness.
“Dad,” Mark said quietly, his voice devoid of any emotion. “She threw my wedding ring on the foyer table this morning and told me to get out of our house. She doesn't want an apology. She wants your company, your reputation, and your freedom.”
Carol began to weep softly, her mascara running in dark streaks down her cheeks. “What are we going to do?”
May you like
Frank stared blankly at his computer screen, where the flashing red notification from the bank remained unyielding.
“We’re going to be destroyed,” Frank whispered.
