Chapter 10 - Why Gregory Planted the Folder
Sloane stopped denying involvement.
“I wanted Ronan to see it before the wedding.”
“Then hand it to me,” Ronan said.
“I could not.”
“You are board chairman.”
“Which is exactly why I could not.”
Ronan looked almost amused by the answer.
Sloane continued.
“Marcus controlled the source records. Arthur had outside counsel prepared. Vivien had your signature token. If I accused them without the original release, I would look like a chairman sabotaging a beneficial marriage because of old loyalties.”
“So you planted a folder.”
“I wanted a board member or counsel to find it.”
“Under the banquet table?”
“I expected staff to discover it during service and bring it to security.”
I stared at him.
“You expected me to find it.”
He looked at me.
“I knew you were assigned to that section.”
There it was.
He had used me too.
Not as violently as Vivien.
Not with a whip.
Still without consent.
“You knew who I was.”
“Yes.”
“From the staffing approval.”
“Yes.”
“And instead of telling me my father’s old case was involved, you placed the evidence near my work station.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Daniel trusted process more than people.”
“That does not mean his daughter volunteered to become your process.”
Sloane lowered his eyes.
“No.”
Ronan’s voice hardened.
“You put Claire in the middle because you were afraid to put your own name on the warning.”
“Yes.”
It was the most honest thing he had said.
Sloane had discovered the current Continuity Agreement four days before the gala.
Marcus accidentally sent a draft to a shared board printer.
Sloane recognized the old Hale debt.
He searched archived emails.
Found Daniel’s warning.
Realized the marriage could trigger a takeover.
He still did not know the original lien had been released.
He wanted Ronan to investigate before signing anything.
So he copied the folder.
He intended discovery.
He did not predict Vivien would assault me beside it.
“Why were you trying to leave when Ronan locked the doors?” I asked.
“Because I knew the folder would point back to me.”
Cowardice again.
Not conspiracy necessarily.
But consequential.
“What about Daniel’s package?”
Sloane looked ashamed.
“I made the worst mistake of my career.”
He had handed it to Marcus five years earlier.
Daniel died.
Sloane convinced himself the matter was finished.
Then Marcus rose.
Vivien entered Ronan’s life.
Hale Meridian began appearing in Blackwood deals.
Each new compromise sat on top of the first.
“Why help now?”
“Because there is a point where protecting the company becomes helping the people stealing it.”
I thought of Dad.
He reached that point earlier.
It cost him everything.
Sloane reached it when his own name started appearing on fake accounts.
Again, people often understand danger fully when it reaches them.
Sloane revealed one more detail.
Vivien had known about Sebastian’s fireplace safe for months.
Arthur told her the original lien release was probably inside.
They searched twice.
Could not open it.
Then Marcus found an old estate maintenance code.
Vivien opened the safe before the gala.
“What did she take?”
“A brown document case.”
“Where is it now?”
“I do not know.”
Security checked her movements.
After removing the case, Vivien went upstairs to her engagement suite.
No camera inside.
She came down without it.
Estate search authority did not allow Ronan to simply enter personal rooms once Vivien had left and claimed property.
Ruth obtained a preservation order.
The suite was inventoried.
No case.
A fireplace contained ash.
Forensic technicians recovered charred paper fragments.
Vivien had burned documents upstairs before guests arrived.
One fragment contained Arthur Hale’s signature.
Another contained the words FULL SATISFACTION.
The original release may have been destroyed.
But fire did not erase the scanned copy, video, Daniel’s flash drive, bank records, and county metadata.
Vivien had attacked physical proof without realizing how much duplication existed.
Dad believed in redundancy.
Again.
The ash also contained something else.
A Blackwood board resolution dated five years earlier.
Title:
TEMPORARY CONTINUITY COUNCIL.
Ruth had never seen it.
Ronan had never seen it.
Sloane stared at the fragment.
“I drafted that.”
“When?”
“After Sebastian died.”
“What did it do?”
“Created emergency governance if Blackwood and Hale entered simultaneous litigation.”
“Who controls the council?”
Sloane did not answer immediately.
Ruth pulled archived board drafts.
The resolution had never been formally activated.
Proposed chair:
Gregory Sloane.
Ronan looked at him.
“You were preparing to take control too.”
Sloane’s face tightened.
“That document was never adopted.”
“Vivien had a copy in the same case as the lien release.”
“I do not know why.”
Ruth searched signatures.
One board approval appeared on the draft.
Marcus Vale.
Another:
Arthur Hale.
Not board members in the same capacity.
Yet they had prepared a structure where if Ronan and Hale entered litigation, Sloane could become temporary corporate controller.
The current crisis matched the condition perfectly.
Sloane had planted the folder that triggered exposure.
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He had also once designed the structure that could benefit him from the resulting war.
Continue to the next part: Gregory’s attempt to warn Ronan may also have activated an old plan that puts Gregory himself in position to control Blackwood.
