Chapter 43 - the final offer
Nora arrived at the original factory with a recording device beneath her coat.
She did not come alone. Investigators waited beyond the property line, unable to enter until Gideon revealed his exact location inside the enormous building.
The factory had closed twenty years earlier, but Katherine’s first laboratory remained intact on the third floor.
Gideon stood beside a metal cabinet filled with notebooks.
“These contain every trial, failure and formula,” he said. “Without them, you cannot prove Katherine created the process.”
“The patent agreement proves ownership.”
“An agreement can be challenged. Scientific records cannot.”
He held the lighter near the first notebook.
“What do you want?”
“Northstar’s shares and a public statement clearing me of wrongdoing.”
“You want me to accuse Malcolm.”
“He already confessed.”
“To his own crimes, not yours.”
Gideon smiled.
“He loved power more than you. Elias loved resentment more than you. Even your father loved the company more than he loved the truth. Yet you still insist loyalty has value.”
Nora looked at Katherine’s notebooks.
“You spent your entire life proving that people could be bought.”
“Most can.”
“Malcolm wanted admiration. Elias wanted his identity. Holloway wanted influence. What did you want?”
Gideon’s hand became still.
“The company should have been mine.”
“My mother created the process.”
“I found the investors.”
“My father built the factories.”
“I kept them from destroying everything.”
“You stole from them and then called the theft leadership.”
Gideon moved the lighter closer to the paper.
“Sign the transfer.”
Nora removed a document from her bag.
Gideon read the first page.
It was not a transfer of Northstar.
It was an agreement establishing a new employee-owned patent trust. The moment the board approved it, Katherine’s patents would no longer belong to any single Vale family member.
“You would give away your control?” he asked.
“I would make certain no one can repeat what you did.”
“You are bluffing.”
“The board approved it twenty minutes ago.”
Gideon’s leverage disappeared.
He dropped the lighter and reached for the cabinet.
May you like
Before he could move it, Malcolm stepped from the laboratory entrance.
“You told me these records were destroyed years ago,” Malcolm said.
