Chapter 8 - Stripping the Armor
The liquidation of Mercer Logistics took less than ten days.
When a company built on debt and vanity is hit with federal fraud charges, it does not slowly decline; it implodes. The Department of Defense canceled its subcontracts within twenty-four hours under the federal procurement integrity act. JP Morgan Chase called its forty-million-dollar line, seizing the company’s accounts receivable.
At the bankruptcy auction held at the federal courthouse, there was only one qualified bidder for the assets, intellectual property, and real estate holdings of Mercer Logistics.
*The Margaret Hayes Foundation for Women and Children.*
I attended the auction in person.
I was fourteen weeks pregnant now. My coat hid the tiny curve of my stomach, but inside me, I felt a continuous, steady warmth. Samuel Whitmore sat to my right; Sarah Lin sat to my left.
Grant Mercer was brought into the courtroom in orange scrubs, his wrists and ankles chained. He had been denied bail as a flight risk after the prosecution presented evidence that he had searched for chartered flights to Dubai three hours before his arrest.
He looked hollowed out. His hair had been cropped short, his posture was shattered, and the arrogance that had once defined every step he took had vanished entirely.
When the judge brought down the gavel—confirming the sale of Mercer Logistics to the Hayes Foundation for the sum of one dollar and the assumption of vetted operational debts—Grant let out a broken, shuddering sob.
The judge adjourned the session.
Before the marshals could lead him back to the holding cells, Grant looked across the mahogany railing at me.
"Eleanor," he rasped. His lips were dry and cracked. "Please. Just tell me one thing."
The marshals paused, glancing at Samuel, who gave a brief, curt nod.
I walked to the railing. I stood three feet from the man I had slept beside for seven years, the man who had promised to protect me, the man who had handed me a trash bag and told me I was nothing.
"What, Grant?"
"Did you ever love me?" he whispered. "Or was I just a project to your grandmother? Was I just a trap from the beginning?"
I looked at him with neither hatred nor anger. Hatred requires passion, and Grant Mercer was no longer worthy of my passion. He was simply a legal problem that had been decisively resolved.
"I loved you with my whole heart, Grant," I said softly. "I gave you my youth, my loyalty, and my trust. My grandmother didn't set a trap for you. She simply built a mirror."
He blinked, tears tracing lines through the grime on his face.
"She knew that an honest man would look into that mirror and build a life with me," I continued. "And she knew that a thief would look into it and try to steal the glass. You destroyed yourself, Grant. You just used my grandmother’s hammer to do it."
May you like
The marshals pulled his chains. He stumbled backward through the steel door, the heavy lock clanking shut behind him, cutting off his weeping forever.
***
