The Middle Child

"OK. So, since you said that you are a lawyer and not a nurse, I would like to know who you are and why you are here with me. Not that I'm complaining, but I'm not sure a lawsuit against the insurgents for pain and suffering will really work out."

She laughed again. I really liked her laugh. "No. I'm not here to try and sue the insurgents. I'm here to thank you for saving my sister's life. My name is Rebecca Caulfield. My sister June was the MP that you pulled out of the Hummer and gave first aid to. Everyone that I've talked to has stated emphatically that if you hadn't done what you did, she would have died."

"So, how is she doing? Will she be OK?" I asked.

"She'll be fine. They managed to save her leg, but she will always have at least a slight limp."

So, that's how I managed to meet Becca and her sister. True to her word, Rebecca spent her days in Germany dividing her time between me and her sister. I decided not to reenlist, and I was discharged with a purple heart and a silver star.

Back stateside, I continued to see Rebecca. We got along really well and began dating. I told her all about my past and how my ex-wife and family had betrayed me. I told her my plan for revenge. Simply stated, I would open my own construction company and compete against them. Being in the military, I really never needed much money. I invested everything I could until I finally had enough to begin my plans. Having been intimately familiar with my family's business, I knew every way to undercut them and begin stealing their clients and better employees. I probably wouldn't be able to completely ruin them, but I could become more successful and significantly decrease their incomes.

Rebecca thought about it for a bit, then got a really devious smile. "How would you like to really burn them?" Then, she told me her plan. I liked it. I liked it a lot.

As it turns out, Rebecca's parents are really wealthy. REALLY wealthy. They also really liked me and were seriously pissed off at my family for what they did. It was also handy that her older brother was a genius financial wizard. Using a combination of assets, a new LLC was formed. Rebecca's semi-retired dad was set up as President of the company. Her brother was named acting CFO, and Rebecca was acting CEO. This was to keep my name off the books. I was pretty much running things, though.

The first thing we did was buy out a small construction company that was being poorly managed. The turnaround was quick once I took over the operations. We added another company 6-months later. By the time we were ready for the endgame, we had acquired five more companies in various parts of the country. Rebecca and I also got really close and began dating exclusively.

Oh, you might be wondering about June. She had healed as much as possible, and with extensive physical therapy, she was able to walk with just a slight limp. She had been medically retired from the military due to her injuries. A rivalry between June and Becca was never an issue for me. While she was extremely grateful to me for saving her life, it was explained to me that I was very much not her type. It seems that her type and my type have several things in common. Had my name been Samantha rather than Samuel, there is a high likelihood that she would be a lot more interested.

Now, here I sat across the street from my family's business waiting to extract my vengeance. Over the last few years, I had become rather wealthy from my investments and the success of our new company. Rebecca and I had become engaged within the last month as well. I was smiling as I waited to burn my former family. They had no clue about what was about to hit them. What they didn't know was that a couple of very specific people had been quietly buying up all the publicly available stock that was available. It was only a week ago that those investors had finally gotten over the required threshold for the plan to succeed.

Steph:

Steph was in a really bad mood. Not that being in a bad mood was unusual for her. In fact, that was pretty much her modus operando for the last several years. She wasn't stupid, she knew that she was not liked by almost everyone that worked for the company. 'Fuck them!' she thought. As CFO and daughter of the Chairman of the Board, she could do anything she wanted. Besides, if things got too bad, she would just talk to her older brother who was CEO. This was a family company. Anyone that gave her any shit would soon find themselves in the unemployment line. That, however, was not the source of her angst at the moment. She was upset because an unscheduled board meeting had been called. This was highly irregular. Usually, the board only met once a quarter. Most meetings were held around the family table. The board only met to rubberstamp decisions that had already been made between her parents, brother, and her. After all, between the four of them, and the proxy votes from her absentee middle brother, they controlled 60% of the shares. Each family member owning 12%.

An explanation needs to be made here. Several years ago, the family (minus Sam who had left without a word) decided that a major expansion was needed. The decision was made to go public and sell shares to gain capitol for expansion. The family made sure that each family member kept 12% of the shares, thereby keeping control with 60% of the company. While no formal agreement had been made with Sam, his shares were used to vote with the family. No one really thought much of it since he refused any contact with us. He even refused to show up for Jimmy and Camile's wedding after Sam had divorced her. None of us even knew where he went or where he was now. After 10-years of silence from him, it was just assumed that his votes belonged to the family for whatever they wanted to do.

Steph paused as she was about to open the door to the office building. A tall, well-built figure was standing across the street. She only managed a quick glimpse, but he seemed somehow familiar. A buss ran by at that point, and the figure had vanished. Shrugging her shoulders, she opened the door and entered the building.

Steph was extremely bored during the meeting. The procedure still had to be followed, even though the board had just met last month and wasn't due to meet for another two months. Reading of the minutes of the last meeting. Old business where they repeated what was discussed last month. Updates on the various divisions -- no changes from last month. Any new business -- of course there was....... "WHAT THE FUCK?"

"I said I am making a motion to remove the Chairman of the Board for gross incompetence and moral failings." Said an attractive brunette. She must have had some sort of an injury, because I noticed a slight limp as she walked.

It was then that Steph noticed that there were far less people than what were normally there for a board meeting. None of the major stockholders that she was used to seeing were in attendance. Instead, there were a few very minor shareholders, the brunette that made the motion, and a blonde woman that had never been there before.

"I second the motion." Shouted out the blonde.

'WTF was going on?' Thought Steph. Surely, they were delusional in thinking that they could get anything like that through. After all, the family maintained 60% of the votes. There was simply no way possible. This stupid woman was about to be completely crushed. Everyone except for the two stupid women were shocked at the movement. Discussion was spirited, but short. The voting began with the expected outcome.

"Ms. Caulfield with 35% of shares votes AYE." Obviously, since she made the motion.

"Ms. Jeffers with 4% of shares votes AYE." Said the blonde. Again, expected since she had seconded the motion.

There were several others that voted NO. There tally came up to 1% of the shares. So, 40% yes, 1% no, and the family holding 60% yet to vote. Of course, Jimmy, me, mom, and dad all voted NO. Daddy was Chairman, after all. 49% NO, against 40% Yes. Just as Jimmy stood up to cast Sam's proxy vote to put us over the edge, the door was flung open and the tall man I had noticed across the street entered.

"Samuel Johnson with 12% votes AYE." Stated my brother who I hadn't seen or heard from in 10-years.

Just that quick, our family business was taken from us and given to the brother who we had abandoned in favor of our older brother. The meeting went downhill from there. Samuel was made Chairman of the Board in place of daddy. Jimmy was summarily fired and replaced with the blonde. I was also fired as CFO and replaced with the brunette. Since none of us could have ever imagine a scenario such as this, we never bothered with contracts. Therefore, there were no severance packages. Golden parachutes? More like lead balloons. 10-minutes to pack up and get off property. That was the good news. All of our houses and cars were company property. It was set up like that for tax purposes. Sam was nice enough to give all of us a week to pack up and move out. Well, all of us except Jimmy and Camile. They only got 24-hours.

Mom, dad, Jimmy, Camile, and I just sat there stunned as Sam took over the meeting. While all the power in the company had just been stripped from us, we were still large shareholders and had every right to remain there in the meeting. At least we still had our shares and the income from that. We also had our retirements through the company. As long as the company existed and was profitable, we should be fine. True, none of us really had much stashed away, only about a hundred thousand each in case of emergencies. Having the company pay our mortgages, utilities, cellphones, and vehicles, we really didn't need a whole lot to live on. We instead had all agreed to funnel most of the profits back into the company and grow it. The plan was to cash out later so we could all retire comfortably while we were still young enough to enjoy it.

"OK." Sam said as he took over the meeting. "Any more new business?"

"Yes. There is one more item to discuss." Stated the attractive brunette. "SRJ Enterprise has made an offer for a buy-out. I believe that you have already had the opportunity to review the buy-out package. The quick version is that they will buy all the shares available, provided that they can purchase at least 51% of the company. Once that is complete, Johnson Construction, Inc. will be closed, and all assets will be absorbed by SRJ Enterprise."

"OK, and what about all the employees? We have a lot of really good people working for us, and I don't want to see them suddenly out of a job and not being able to support their families."

"Mr. Johnson, all non-executive employees will simply continue working as before. The only difference that they will see is the name of the company on their checks. Our clients will still be working with the people that they are familiar with. All executives will be either terminated or placed in a similar position with SRJ. I should mention that they have asked that the Chairman of the Board, CEO and CFO move over to the same positions with SRJ. Their current chairman will be stepping down, as well as their CEO and CFO."

"What about those who do not wish to sell their stocks?" Sam asked as he glared at us. "I'm sure that there will be those who won't wish to sell."

"Oh, well, the representative from SRJ actually said that once they had secured 51%, the price for purchasing any remaining stock will be drastically reduced. Obviously, they won't really need any further stocks, and when the news hits as to what their plan is, the value of the outstanding stocks will plummet. Any holdouts will find that their investment has disappeared."

"Very well. Is the representative here?"

"Yes. She is out in the lobby waiting. She wanted to be available as she was hoping to get moving on this today. Would you like to page Security and have her escorted in?"

Sam called Security, and a few minutes later an absolute goddess strutted through the doors. She was about 5' 7" tall, long luxurious red hair down to her waist, Emerald green eyes, beautiful face with a light smattering of freckles across her slim nose, I would estimate about 36C breasts, and a slim waist that flared out to a really nice set of hips. She was wearing a charcoal-colored pencil skirt with a matching jacket and light pink blouse. Her long, toned legs were encased in silk stockings, and she had 4-inch Prada heels on her feet. I was wondering what the fuck was going on with all these attractive women somehow showing up today and stealing our company from us. Furthermore, what did Sam have to do with this? It was becoming blatantly obvious that he was part of this scheme. We hadn't heard a peep from him for 10-years, and he suddenly shows up today of all days? Then he proceeds to vote his family out of the business that dad had started, and we had grown? What the fuck was he doing? Why was he doing this?

"....So, as I said earlier, we are offering $120 per share for the first 51%. After that, anyone who wishes to sell will be offered $2 per share. It just isn't worth any more than that to us once we have acquired majority control."

Shit! I missed the first part of what she said. I really wished that I had not heard the rest. Going from $120 per share down to $2 per share was disastrous. Sure, I really didn't want to sell, but not selling would be devastating. I quickly stood up and screamed that I wanted to sell. Better get in line early while I could.

The redhead got a brilliant smile on her face as she turned to me. "Of course. We will be happy to purchase your shares. You are fourth in line right now, so I will make you our offer just as soon as I have completed the first three transactions."

My stomach turned as I made a calculated guess as to who the first three sellers were. Being fourth was pretty much the same as being last. I watched as Sam, then the blonde, then the brunette, all signed off on the sale of their stocks. She already had her 51%. All of our money was tied up in the company. In another 5-years, we were planning on selling and cashing in. We would have been multi-millionaires. Now, we would be lucky to end up eleventhousandaires.

We all had to Uber home to start packing. Security confiscated our cars and office keys before we were allowed to leave the property. We had to schedule with security to come in the next day and clean out our offices. The blonde announced that she would be stripping all of us of our access to the company servers, and that our logins would be deactivated withing the next few minutes. That didn't really matter much because our laptops had been confiscated earlier. The blonde also informed us that IT would be by the next day to confiscate our home computers. Furthermore, if any evidence was found that we had attempted to delete or corrupt any files before they got there, severe charges of corporate espionage, fraud, evidence tampering, and embezzlement would be filed. Jimmy was informed that his computer had been confiscated by IT techs right after the vote to remove dad from his position.

"Oh, and we have a forensic accountant already looking at the books." Sam smiled.

It was the next evening when everyone met at their parent's house. Jimmy, Camile, and their three children had arrived with a moving van full of everything that they could hurriedly pack into it. With the short notice and no other options, they would be moving in with Jacob and Evelyn as they made other living arrangements before the week was up. After the truck was unloaded into the garage temporarily, the family members gathered around the table to plan the future.

"OK. We need to figure out how we are going to respond. We can't just sit back and take this. We need to fight back and get back what is ours." Jacob stated.

"Fine." Evelyn answered. "But what are we going to do? How can we fight this? Where do we even start?"

"We'll get our lawyers on it and begin filing lawsuits."

"Uuummm, dad? We don't have any lawyers. The lawyers are for the company, and we no longer control the company. We would need to hire another lawyer, and they cost money. Now, I know that we each have accounts where we stashed money, but this is going to be a long legal fight, and right now I need whatever cash I have to live on until I can get another job and get back on my feet." Stephanie informed.

"Maybe it's time I go and pay my little brother a visit." Jimmy grinned as he cracked his knuckles.

Camile eyed her husband critically. She had gotten a VERY good look at her tall, muscular, and confident ex-husband as he steamrolled over them in the boardroom. "I would strongly advise against that." She stated. "It didn't end well for you the last time you tried it, and he looks a lot tougher and stronger now than he did back then."

The conversation went on for another half our as suggestions were made, then shot down. Stephanie had listened in without adding to the suggestions. She had added to the criticism of each stupid idea though. She was listening for the one idea that no one was mentioning. It was the one thing that had even the slightest chance. She knew that it wouldn't fix everything, but it just might offer a modicum of relief to their current situation.

"Maybe we could just go talk to him."

The sudden silence was deafening as everyone in the room suddenly looked in her direction as if she had suddenly grown a third eye.

"Maybe if we went over and talked to him and begged forgiveness for how we treated him. Maybe if we beg for mercy from him, he would not be so harsh. It's obvious that he will never give everything back, but maybe if we grovel before him and admit that we were so very wrong in how we treated him, he might just ease our pain enough that we can survive and not be completely ruined."

Pandemonium ensued.

"You expect me to go up to him with my tail between my legs and humiliate myself to that little snot-nosed brat after he abandoned his family? Then he comes back here after 10-years without a single word and backstabs his own flesh and blood? Are you insane? I will never disgrace myself by bowing down in front of that ungrateful bastard!" Jacob roared.

"Seriously, sis? After then way he treated my wife and I before he ran away, then with what he did today, you really think that there is any way that I would do anything except find a way to put him back under that slimy rock he crawled out of? HELL NO!" Jimmy shouted.

Even Camile screamed her distaste of groveling before her wimpy ex-husband. "Jimmy is 10-times the man that Sam is. There is no way that I will ever disgrace myself and my husband by begging that wimp for anything."

"Dear," Her mom stated in a voice of a mother who loves her daughter but must chide her for being clueless. "I understand what you are thinking, but we need to go to war with the person who has attacked this family's wellbeing. This is the time for fighting back, not conceding defeat. No, we will not talk to our new enemy. We will find a way to attack and take back what is ours." She finished.

Having thoroughly dismissed Steph's idea is imbecilic, the discussion resumed to possible ways of fighting back. Steph remained silent as the talk continued around her. She had made up her mind what she needed to do for herself. She needed to jump ship before the train-wreck happened. She had understood too late what their 'loving' family had done to her older brother, but Sam had disappeared by then. She was never able to tell him how sorry she was for her words and actions. She had been a self-centered spoiled brat back then. Her epiphany came two weeks too late.

June Caulfield looked up as Stephanie Johnson was let into her office by the secretary the next morning. She noticed that Stephanie was wearing a very nice navy-blue pencil skirt, matching jacket, powder blue dress blouse, black stockings and 4-inch heels. Over-all, it was a very nice, yet conservative look. Stephanie's blonde hair was styled professionally, and her makeup was tastefully applied. Although June had heard all of the stories about what a cast-iron bitch Steph was, she was still a very attractive package.