Watching Them Burn: My Rebirth Story novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: The Foundation Falls

Luka's POV

The Abercrombie Family Foundation kept its offices on the top floor of a glass building downtown, and on Monday morning I walked into them in the only suit I owned.

Darby came with me.

I had not asked her to, and she had not asked if she could.

She just stood beside me in the elevator with her hand in mine, watching the numbers climb.

The boardroom had a long table of polished wood and six chairs on one side.

Five of them were filled.

The sixth was empty, and Dane's father stood at the far end of the room with his arms stiff at his sides.

The woman at the head of the table was gray-haired and sharp-eyed.

She had been the Foundation's treasurer for thirty years.

"Mr. Hanlon," she said. "Miss Aldrich. Thank you for coming. Please sit."

I sat.

Darby sat next to me.

Dane's father did not sit.

"This is a farce," he said. "A board meeting called over a weekend, because of a video."

"It's called under the Foundation's bylaws," the treasurer said. "Four of us signed the notice. You were told."

"A video taken out of context."

"I've watched it twice," she said. "I watched Miss Stanhope's statement, too. Then I pulled the scholarship ledger for the year Mr. Hanlon won the state final."

She laid a thin folder on the table and opened it.

"Two years ago, the aquatics donor award went to a swimmer named in a memo from the chairman. That memo is dated three weeks after the race. It cancels an award already approved in writing for Mr. Hanlon."

My mouth went dry.

"It's in your handwriting," she said to the man in the gray suit. "The funds went to a club your family sponsors."

"It was a discretionary reallocation."

"It was theft from a student, and it was done to protect your son from a rival."

The room was very quiet.

"This term," she said, "you paid Miss Stanhope's tuition through a Foundation account with no board approval. The same account paid a voice coach. The same account paid for the banner, the stream and a private security firm that changed the locks on the auditorium booth."

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