Chapter 4 - Isolation
By Saturday afternoon, the empire of Mason Ericson was bleeding from a thousand cuts, and the city he thought he owned had begun to treat him like a ghost.
The St. Marcellus Academy board of trustees held an emergency meeting via an encrypted video call at 2:00 p.m. Mason sat in his temporary command center—a hotel suite at the Mandarin Oriental, since his high-rise office remained a digital dead zone.
"Mason, we have no choice," said Julian Sterling, the head of the school board, his digital image looking exhausted. "The school’s endowment fund was held at Boston First National. At 9:00 a.m., the bank informed us that our accounts have been flagged for secondary auditing due to an anonymous tip regarding offshore tuition laundering. We can't pay our staff next week."
"It’s a bluff!" Mason roared, slamming his fist onto the mahogany desk. "I will personally write a check to cover the payroll from my private account!"
"Your private accounts were frozen three hours ago, Mason," Julian said quietly. "The Department of Justice filed an emergency injunction. They’re investigating Ericson Enterprises for violating maritime trade laws. The science wing is canceled. And the board has voted to reinstate Amara Brooks with a full apology and a permanent tenure track."
"You can't do that!" Mason screamed. "I built that school!"
"The school was here before you, Mason. And if we don't distance ourselves from you, the school won't survive the month," Julian said, and the screen went black as he disconnected the call.
Mason threw his phone against the wall, the glass shattering into a web of silver shards. He turned to Richard Vance, who was standing by the door with a tablet that seemed to be delivering nothing but bad news.
"Where is the boy?" Mason demanded, his voice hoarse. "Where is Ethan?"
"He’s at the estate, sir. I have four armed guards with him," Vance said, though his voice lacked conviction. "But Mason... we have another problem. Our private security contractors? The firm we’ve used for ten years? They just pulled their men."
"What do you mean, they pulled their men? I pay them half a million a year!"
"The owner of the firm called me five minutes ago," Vance whispered, looking down at the floor. "He said he received a single phone call from an unlisted number. The caller didn't threat him. He just recited the names of the owner’s children, the schools they attend, and the license plates of the cars their wives drive. The owner told me he wouldn't protect you for fifty million dollars. The guards at the Beacon Hill estate are leaving as we speak."
Mason sank into the leather sofa, his chest heaving. He felt a cold, oily sweat breaking out along his hairline. His friends, his business partners, his political contacts—people who had dined at his table for decades—had stopped answering his calls. When he tried to reach the mayor’s office, he was put on hold for forty minutes before being told the mayor was in an "extended briefing."
"It’s her," Mason whispered, his eyes wide and bloodshot. "The teacher. The pregnant bitch. She’s doing this."
"Sir, she’s an English teacher," Vance said, shaking his head. "She grew up in foster homes. She doesn't have the resources to freeze a multi-billion-dollar corporation or dismantle a private security firm in twenty-four hours. This is the work of a state actor, or... or someone much worse."
"Then find out who she’s talking to!" Mason screamed, standing up and grabbing Vance by the lapels of his jacket. "Look at her records! Look at her past! Someone is backing her, Vance! Find the hand in the dark and cut it off!"
Vance nodded quickly, pulling away from his boss’s erratic grip. "I have a contact at the state registry. He’s digging into her foster records now. If she has a connection to someone powerful, we’ll find it."
As Vance left the room, Mason walked back to the window. The sky over Boston was turning a bruised, heavy gray, the precursor to a autumn storm. The city looked different now. The lights didn't look like achievements; they looked like eyes, all of them watching him fall.
He didn't know that three floors below his hotel suite, sitting in a quiet sedan parked across the street, Silas Brooks was watching the windows of the Mandarin Oriental.
May you like
Silas held a small, black notebook in his lap. He opened it, drew a clean, straight line through the name Julian Sterling, and then moved his pen down to the next name on the list:
Mason Ericson.
