Chapter 7 - The Fallout in Mayfair
While Zara and her father settled into the plush leather interior of a sleek black chauffeured sedan driving through the misty London streets toward Mayfair, Richard Bennett was living through a corporate nightmare.
His flight had landed forty minutes after Flight 212.
By the time Richard dragged his heavy leather briefcase through the automated sliding doors of Heathrow Terminal 5, his phone—charged briefly via a public terminal kiosk—was vibrating so violently it nearly slipped from his sweaty palm.
He tapped the screen. It was his chief financial officer, Arthur Vance.
“Arthur! Listen to me, the logistics portal locked up right as—!”
*“Where the hell are you, Richard?!”* Arthur’s voice roared through the speaker, sounding shrill and panicked. “The emergency audit team from Coleman Global just seized our primary shipping accounts! Every container we have docked in Rotterdam and New York has been slapped with an indefinite customs hold!”
Richard stopped dead in the middle of the crowded terminal concourse, a businessman in a trench coat bumping hard against his shoulder.
“Seized? That’s impossible! We have a five-year contract with the transport alliance!”
*“We had a contract!”* Arthur yelled back. “They invoked Clause 9—gross corporate misconduct and breach of supply ethics by a tier-one executive partner! The board is in an absolute panic. Half our institutional investors are pulling their funding as we speak! What did you do?!”
Richard stared blankly at a digital flight arrival board flickering above his head.
The image of fourteen-year-old Zara Coleman standing quietly in the aisle of first class flashed across his mind with brutal clarity.
*“You have no idea who you're speaking to,”* he had sneered at her.
*“That’s interesting,”* she had replied, her voice entirely steady. “You haven't asked who you're speaking to either.”
The phone went dead. Arthur had hung up.
Richard slowly lowered the device. The screen faded to black, reflecting his own pale, hollow face staring back at him. The custom-made pinstripe suit suddenly felt like a straitjacket.
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He wasn't a king of industry anymore. He was just a man who had made the worst mistake of his professional life because he couldn't bear the thought of being corrected by a child.
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