Chapter 5 - The Gathering of the Wolves
The county courthouse on February twenty-fourth was a cavernous, limestone building that smelled of damp wool, old paper, and the sharp chemical sting of industrial floor wax. The public auction room was located in the basement—a stark, windowless space with rows of heavy oak benches and a raised podium where the deputy sheriff stood with a clipboard and a wooden gavel.
I arrived at 9:45 a.m., wearing a long charcoal coat and dark leather gloves. I didn't sit in the front rows; I took a place at the very back, near the heavy double exit doors, my face partially shielded by the shadow of the gallery pillar.
Ten minutes later, the double doors groaned open, and my family walked in.
They looked like ghosts of the people who had sat at the birthday dinner ten months ago. My father was leaning heavily on a brass-topped cane, his skin a sallow, translucent gray, his expensive suit looking loose and wrinkled around his shrunken shoulders. My mother walked beside him, her face tight with a frantic, red-eyed misery, her hands clutching a worn leather purse like it was a life preserver.
Behind them came Heather and her husband, Brad. Brad’s head was down, his hands shoved deep into his pockets, looking like a man who had spent the last forty-eight hours listening to his credit score dissolve into the atmosphere. Heather was the only one who still carried a spark of the old, vicious defiance; her eyes scanned the room with a sharp, predatory anger until they locked onto me at the back of the gallery.
She stopped dead in the aisle. She pointed a trembling, manicured finger at my face.
"You," she hissed, her voice carrying clearly over the low murmur of the other bidders. "You actually came to watch. You monster. You dynamic piece of garbage. You came to watch your father lose his life's work."
The room went completely silent. The deputy sheriff at the podium looked up from his clipboard, his brow furrowing. "Ma'am, please take a seat. The bidding session is about to commence."
My father turned slowly, his cane clicking against the linoleum floor as he looked back toward the pillar. When his eyes met mine, there was no anger left in them—only a deep, hollow, and terrifyingly small pleading. His mouth opened slightly, his throat moving as he tried to form my name, but no sound came out. He looked exactly like what he was: a man who had spent his whole life playing the king, only to discover the kingdom had been rented from the daughter he despised.
I didn't move. I didn't take off my gloves. I looked straight through them as if they were made of glass.
"Property number forty-two," the deputy sheriff announced, his voice booming through the microphone. "The lake house estate located at 1104 Lakeshore Drive, River Forest. Current outstanding judgment stands at two hundred and fourteen thousand, five hundred dollars. The bank opens the bidding at one hundred and fifty thousand."
A representative from a local development company raised a plastic paddle. "One hundred and fifty."
"One hundred and sixty," a man in the second row called out.
Heather lunged toward the front row, slamming her hands onto the wooden barrier. "Arthur! Do something! You said we had the emergency motion!"
Arthur Vance, who was sitting at the defense table near the podium, simply shook his head, his eyes fixed on his legal pads. "The motion was struck down, Heather. We don't have the funds for the bond. There’s nothing left to do."
"One hundred and seventy," the developer said.
I raised my black leather glove two inches into the air.
The bank’s representative at the front table looked back at me, checked his digital monitor, and nodded. "We have a proxy bid from Hayes Holdings at two hundred and fifteen thousand dollars."
My father stiffened as if a current of electricity had passed through his cane. He turned his head back toward me, his eyes wide with a frantic, desperate confusion. Hayes Holdings. He knew the name of my primary consulting firm. He knew exactly whose hand was holding the paddle.
"Two hundred and fifteen thousand once," the sheriff called out. "Two hundred and fifteen thousand twice."
May you like
The room was completely still. The developer looked back at me, saw the absolute, unblinking grey of my eyes, and lowered his paddle. He knew when a bidder had a personal bottomless well.
"Sold," the sheriff said, the wooden gavel striking the podium with a sharp crack that echoed off the limestone walls. "To Hayes Holdings. Please step to the clerk's desk to finalize the escrow transfer."
