The Heir Who Quit Luxury novel · Chapter 9 of 32

Chapter 9: Brannock's Word

"What did you tell him?" I asked.

"I asked him what he was offering."

My heart sank.

"And?"

"Fifty thousand dollars. Cash." She tapped the phone. "To fire a salesman who's worked here seven weeks. I told him I'd think about it."

"Frankie."

"Roof," she said. "Now. You're going to tell me why a billion-dollar company wants you gone."

We climbed the ladder.

The superstore's floodlights lit the whole roof white.

Frankie sat in her lawn chair and crossed her arms.

I stayed standing.

"My grandfather is Hollis Penrose," I said.

She didn't move.

"My mother is his only daughter. She married a tow-truck driver, and he cut her off. The tow-truck driver was my dad."

"Danny," she said.

"Danny Brannock. He offered me the company. I said no."

Frankie's mouth opened a little.

"Then you drove down Eight Mile and asked me for a job selling a Kia."

"Yes."

She stared at me.

Then she started laughing.

She laughed so hard she had to grab the arms of her chair.

"You turned down a billion dollars," she gasped, "for twenty-five percent of a lime-green Kia."

"Nine hundred and seventy-five dollars," I said. "I've still got it."

She laughed harder.

Then she stopped.

She wiped her eyes and looked at me, and there was nothing funny on her face anymore.

"That's why he came," she said. "Carter. The check. The superstore. It's not about the corner."

"It's about me. As long as I'm broke, I might give in. And everything goes to him if I don't."

"And today?"

"Today my grandfather told me my mother asked him for forty grand for my dad's heart surgery. He told her to take his name back first."

Frankie went very still.

"She said no?"

"She said no. Dad died eight weeks later."

Frankie got up out of her chair.

She walked to the edge of the roof and looked across at the superstore and its thirty-foot banner.

"So if you quit," she said, "if you go up that hill and take the money, you're saying she was wrong."

"Yes."

"And if you lose this lot?"

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