Chapter 5: Boardroom

I walked back down the corridor to Eric's door.

Melanie stood in the doorway with one hand on the frame.

Behind her I could see the small shape in the bed and a nurse holding his hand.

"Eric," I called past my wife. "Buddy, I'm right here."

"Dad!"

"I'm not going anywhere. I'll be in the hall, okay? Listen for me."

Melanie's face was gray.

"Go home, Dalton."

"I'll go when he stops crying."

"I'll have you arrested."

"Do it," I said. "Do it in front of him."

She did not.

She stepped back and shut the door.

It took Eric another ten minutes to quiet down, and I stood against the wall the whole time.

When the nurse came out and nodded at me, I understood he was asleep.

Then I did what I should have done a day ago.

I stopped asking my wife and went looking for the man who knew.

Ames Builders had thirty-one employees and one boardroom.

On Mondays at nine every one of them sat in it for the weekly meeting.

I walked in at ten past, unshaven, in yesterday's shirt, with Eric's blood dried brown on one cuff.

The room went quiet.

At the head of the table, in the chair my father had used for thirty years, sat Bradley.

He had a laser pointer in his hand and a slide on the wall behind him.

"Dalton," he said, smiling. "Sit down. We heard about Eric. How is he?"

"Get out of my father's chair."

"We're in the middle of the Harbor Street bid."

"Get out of it."

Bradley looked around the room, then back at me.

He put the pointer down and stood.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Don't Give Me Tainted Love from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.