They Gave Me a Monthly Allowance, So I Took Back My Building novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Last Page
Caterina refuses to sign a restructuring that gives her shares to names nobody will say, and takes the draft; the last page is already signed for her by her aunt.
Ruggero had a glass of water and the espresso I like waiting at my place before I even sat down.
He slid the agreement across the boardroom table.
"Take all the time you need, Caterina. It's a small change to the company structure. Donata has already been through it."
A dozen people sat around the table.
The sales director, the operations manager, and the old hands who had worked for my father were all there.
Every one of them had a thick folder in front of them.
I had a single stapled draft.
Donata sat at the head of the table with her coffee. Ruggero sat beside her.
I put the pen down and turned back to page one.
"I'd like to read it first."
"Of course," Donata said. "That's why we asked you here."
Page three took me four minutes.
It moved my seventy percent of Bellandi Estates into a "management allocation pool." My dividends would stop.
In their place I would receive a monthly sum "set by the management committee."
I looked up.
"So I hand over my shares, and then you decide how much I'm allowed to live on?"
"It's a restructuring," Ruggero said. "Not a punishment."
"Who gets the shares?"
He folded his hands and answered patiently.
"Key staff will be rewarded. Some will go to new partners. We're negotiating exports with other families, and we can't run the business the way your father did."
"Where's the list?"
"Still being finalized."
"The allowance is decided, but the people getting my shares aren't?"
Donata set her cup down.
"Cat, nobody's taking anything from you. We'll make sure you're looked after."
She had said that to me for twelve years.
When I turned eighteen, my aunt made me sit with the annual reports. Donata explained them to me line by line, patiently, over long dinners. After a while I stopped reading them. She was so good at it.
I looked at the blank space on page three where the names should have been.
"Is this really what you want, Donata?"
"Ruggero and I wrote it together." She held my eyes. "I built three labels nobody had heard of into the best restaurants in Europe. You come home for two weeks a year, and your dividends are bigger than what this whole team earns."
"I know what you built."
"Then you know we're asking for security. That isn't greedy."
The sales director leaned forward. He had carried my father's coffin.
"Miss Bellandi, we loved your father. But he's been gone twenty-two years. Donata is the one who sits across from the buyers. We're the ones in the warehouse at midnight."
The operations manager nodded.
"As long as this company is standing, we'll take care of you."
"Why should my income depend on your being kind to me?"
He opened his mouth and shut it again.
"If you're underpaid, we can talk about salaries," I said. "Or bonuses. That's a different conversation from asking for my shares."
I closed the draft.
"I trusted Donata to run the wineries. I never agreed to give them away."
Nobody spoke.
An old foreman by the door cleared his throat. He had been called in to bring the warehouse figures.
"The hill house crew heard the same thing, ma'am," he said. "Everybody at Casa Ferri has been wondering."
He meant the old estate. My father renamed it the day he bought it. The workers still hadn't changed.
Ruggero reached for the draft.
"This clearly isn't the right day. Go home, think about it, and we'll meet again."
I put my hand flat on the cover.
"I'm keeping it."
"It's an internal document."
"It has my name on it. A lawyer will read every page before I decide anything."
He looked at Donata.
It was a long moment before she nodded.
"Let her have it."
Only then did he take his hand away.
I slid the draft into my bag and stood.
"I want the full proposal, the names of everyone receiving shares, and the last twelve months of financial statements. We can talk when I have them."
Ruggero smiled without agreeing to anything.
"Don't make this ugly, Cat. We're family."
"Then you should have asked me before you wrote my name on it."
The operations manager gathered his papers as I passed.
"A piece of paper isn't worth wrecking twenty years of trust," he murmured.
I let that go unanswered.
Donata followed me to the door. Her voice dropped.
"Your aunt asked me to look after you. Give Ruggero a chance. He's new to this family."
"I gave him the finances. I didn't give him my shares."
"I'll explain it to Agnese."
I stopped.
"Don't. I'll tell her myself."
In the corridor I took out the draft and turned to the last page, to see exactly what they had wanted me to sign.
Above the signature line, someone had already typed: Signed for C. Bellandi by her attorney-in-fact, Agnese Bellandi.
It was dated yesterday.
My aunt had signed for me before I had even been asked.
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