The other day, you didn't have to. " Yes, I did," Emma said. Most people would have Kayla. Emma looked at her directly. You came into that shop on a difficult day and you were afraid and you stayed anyway and you got back in the chair.
That required more of you than it required of me. She paused. " The word fits." Kayla pressed her lips together. Her eyes went bright for a second and she blinked it back with the practiced efficiency of someone who has decided she's not going to cry in her work vest. "
Okay," she said. " I have to get back, but I wanted She made a gesture that encompassed the shop, the word on her wrist the day before yesterday. Everything. Thank you. She left.
William watched the door close. " She's going to be all right," he said. " She was already all right," Emma said. " She just didn't know yet." The afternoon continued.
At 4, Emma got a text from Marcus "Grand jury presentation scheduled. Three weeks. Patricia will confirm." Emma read it twice, set the phone down, and picked up a sketchbook, and began working on a design a customer had commissioned two weeks ago that she hadn't been able to find the right approach to. It was a piece commemorating the customer's father, a man who had worked 30 years as a mechanic and had hands that her customer described as the most reliable thing she had ever known.
Emma had been circling the design, trying different approaches. And now she set pencil to paper and let it come. It came easily. She knew something now that she hadn't quite known two weeks ago. At 5:30, the last appointment of the day left and Emma was cleaning her station when her phone rang with a number she didn't recognize.
She almost didn't answer. Then something made her. Ms. Carter, a man's voice, older, careful. My name is Leonard Park. I'm an attorney.
I represent Meridian Capital Group, which is one of the investment principals behind Pinnacle Financial Recovery. Emma's hand went still on the cleaning cloth. " I'm aware of who Meridian Capital is," she said carefully. Then you're aware that my clients have a significant financial interest in how the current situation resolves, Leonard Park said. His voice was smooth and unhurried and professional.
The voice of a man who spent his days managing large problems on behalf of people who paid very well to have large problems managed. " I'm calling because my clients believe there may be an opportunity for resolution that serves everyone's interests." Emma said nothing. " Ms. Carter, my clients are prepared to make a very substantial offer to you personally contingent on your withdrawal from the current legal proceedings and your agreement not to provide further information or testimony. " Mr. Park," Emma said.
He stopped. I want to be very clear about something. She said, whatever number you're about to say, it doesn't matter what the number is. I want you to understand that before you say it because I don't want there to be any confusion afterward about what I heard and what I said. A pause. "
I'm listening," Leonard Park said. There are 48 families. Emma said 48 people who lost money they didn't know who were threatened with legal action that wasn't legal who made decisions based on fear that your clients manufactured deliberately. Her voice was even completely steady. One of them was an elderly woman who paid $11,000 on a discharged debt.
One of them was a veteran who sold his truck. One of them drove from Mesa this afternoon with with a worn envelope full of documents that he'd kept for 1four months because he didn't know why he was keeping them. Just that it felt important. Just that what happened to him was real and deserved to be remembered. She stopped. "
There is no number, Mr. Park. Do you understand me? There is no number." Silence. Leonard Park said, "Ms. Carter, I urge you to think carefully."
I've been thinking carefully for eight months." Emma said, "I'm done thinking. We're in the doing part now." She paused. " Don't call this number again."
She ended the call. She set the phone on the counter. She became aware that William Walker was looking at her from across the room. He had heard enough. He hadn't tried to hide that he was listening. "
Meridian Capital," she said. " I know who they are," William said. " They offered me money to go away." " I assumed." Emma looked at the phone, at the counter, at the flash sheets on the shelf in the helmet behind the register.
At the handwritten sign someone had taped to the outside of her door that morning that she hadn't taken down and didn't intend to. They're scared, she said. Not triumphant, just observational, the flat noting of a fact. Yes, William said. Good, Emma said.
She finished cleaning her station. She locked the front door. She turned off the shop lights one by one the way she did every evening, moving through the familiar sequence without having to think about it. The routine of closing a place you have built yourself and tend yourself and refused to let anyone take from you. She paused at the counter.
She picked up the phone and called Patricia. " Leonard Park called me," she said. When Patricia answered, her voice sharpened immediately. " From Meridian?" " Yes." "