Chapter 10: All Hands

On Wednesday morning I took the train in at my old time, an hour early.

Nobody saw me arrive.

I stood by the dock doors in my funeral suit and waited for eight o'clock.

Kayla came out of the elevator with a box of tissues and her resignation letter in her hand.

"Allison called the whole company to the warehouse floor," she said. "All hands, nine sharp."

"She wanted to explain before you did."

"Is she going to?"

"I don't know what she's going to do. I've never seen her like this."

At nine, three hundred people stood among the pallet racks.

Drivers, loaders, dispatchers, accountants, the night crew in their yellow vests.

Allison stood on the loading platform at the front with her hands folded.

Brody leaned against a pillar behind her with his arms crossed and his jaw still faintly yellow.

Allison cleared her throat.

"Thank you all for coming," she said. "There has been a change in the company's ownership."

"I'll say it," I said.

I walked out from behind the racks.

Three hundred heads turned.

I climbed the three steps to the platform and stood next to her.

She did not stop me.

"Most of you know me," I said. "I'm Russell Kemper. Operations."

"Last week I resigned in a ballroom."

A few people nodded.

"On Tuesday I learned my mother, Frances Kemper, owned forty percent of this company for twelve years."

"She left every share to me."

The warehouse went completely silent.

"As of this morning I am the largest shareholder of Draper Logistics."

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