Chapter 14: The Ordinary Authority
By the end of the first year the company had absorbed the disruption and continued.
A revised set of internal controls governed any executive access that intersected with family-linked share structures. I had written most of the protocol myself. No one asked me to soften the language for the sake of appearances. The board preferred the clarity that followed a documented breach. Kenneth’s name surfaced occasionally in industry gossip and then less often. The criminal referral proceeded on its own timeline; I received periodic notices as a named party and filed them without comment. My work remained the work. The title on my door remained the title I had earned before the marriage and had kept after it.
May you like
I sold the Cherry Hills house through counsel. The furnishings went with it. I bought a smaller property closer to the office, furnished it for function, and stopped treating domestic space as a stage on which a husband’s ambitions had to be hosted. On weekends I ran the same long routes I had run as a younger executive, before Kenneth’s schedule had trained me out of the habit. The body that had been altered without consent still belonged to me. I used it accordingly.
Maya made no further contact. I required none.
