Chapter 7 - Logan Did Not Want to Be Her Evidence
By Friday, half the school had seen the video.
Victoria had not released it.
Hannah had not released it.
Someone at Hawthorne had.
A ten-second clip circulated among students.
Logan crying.
His hand touching his hair.
Ms. Prescott saying:
“That was the point.”
The captions were worse.
RICH CEO MOM ABOUT TO DESTROY TEACHER.
PRIVILEGED KID CAN’T HANDLE CONSEQUENCES.
Some students defended him.
Some mocked him.
Most simply watched.
Logan refused breakfast.
Victoria stood in his bedroom doorway.
“You don’t have to go to school.”
“I know.”
“You don’t have to go back at all.”
“I know.”
He pulled the blanket higher.
Victoria sat on the floor instead of the bed.
After a while Logan said:
“You made it bigger.”
She looked up.
“What?”
“You went there in your work clothes.”
Victoria almost laughed from disbelief.
“My work clothes?”
“Everyone filmed your car.”
“I didn’t call reporters.”
“You’re Victoria.”
He said her name the way people at Crownwell did.
As though it were a position.
“When you do something, people watch.”
The words hurt because they were true.
“I came because you needed me.”
“I know.”
“Would you rather I hadn’t?”
“No.”
Then:
“But now everybody says I’m the CEO kid.”
Victoria looked at him.
“You are my kid.”
“That’s not what they mean.”
No.
It wasn’t.
They meant money.
Power.
Influence.
Exactly what Ms. Prescott had accused him of using.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For not thinking about what it would feel like after.”
Logan turned toward her.
“You always think about after.”
“At work.”
“Yeah.”
That hurt too.
Victoria sat quietly.
Then he asked:
“Are you going to use Hannah’s video against Uncle Malcolm?”
Victoria stopped.
“How do you know about Malcolm?”
“You talk loud.”
Fair.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because Hannah recorded what happened to you. Not a corporate scandal.”
“But it proves they wanted you to leave.”
“It may.”
“So?”
Victoria understood.
Evidence blurred ownership.
“I’ll use it where necessary.”
Logan frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“It means I’m not putting your worst moment in a board presentation unless there is no other way.”
He looked relieved.
“Can you stop people sharing it?”
“Not completely.”
“Then what can you do?”
She hated how little power answered that question.
“Ask the school to protect your privacy.”
“Lawyers?”
“Yes.”
“More lawyers.”
“Probably.”
Logan groaned.
Victoria smiled faintly.
Then:
“What do you want?”
He stared at the wall.
“My hair back.”
She swallowed.
“I know.”
“I don’t want everyone looking.”
“I know.”
“I don’t want to be brave about it.”
Victoria’s eyes burned.
“You don’t have to.”
He finally looked at her.
“You keep saying that.”
“Because adults love turning kids into inspirational stories when we don’t know how to undo what happened.”
Logan almost smiled.
“Did Dr. Google tell you that?”
“No. I’m naturally wise.”
“You’re not.”
Progress.
Later Hannah visited.
She looked miserable.
“They think I’m a snitch.”
Logan said:
“You are.”
Hannah stared.
He smiled.
She threw a pillow at him.
Then started crying.
“I’m sorry.”
“Stop being sorry.”
“I recorded her.”
“Good.”
“Now Ms. Prescott might never teach again.”
Logan touched the side of his head.
“She probably shouldn’t.”
Hannah looked toward Victoria.
Victoria did not answer for him.
Hannah asked:
“Was I wrong to record?”
Victoria thought carefully.
“You saw something you believed was wrong and preserved it.”
“That’s not yes.”
“I’m not going to teach you that secretly recording people is always right.”
Hannah waited.
“But I’m grateful you did it.”
That was enough.
Grace arrived that afternoon.
She had traced the anonymous leak of the classroom clip.
Not to a student.
To an email account registered through Hawthorne’s public relations contractor.
Victoria stared.
“The school leaked it?”
“Someone with access to their crisis folder.”
“Why?”
Grace placed printed emails down.
Principal Bell had sent the video to Malcolm’s communications adviser twenty minutes after Victoria arrived.
Subject:
POSSIBLE REPUTATION ISSUE.
Malcolm’s adviser replied:
IF THIS SPREADS, VICTORIA WILL BE TOO BUSY DEFENDING HER SON TO FIGHT THE DEAL.
Victoria felt ice.
The humiliation had two uses.
First, pull her from the boardroom.
Then keep her occupied.
“Did Malcolm authorize the leak?”
“We don’t have that yet.”
“Bell?”
“His account sent the file.”
Victoria stood.
Logan had been right.
Her power made every move bigger.
Malcolm knew it.
He had turned her son into public noise.
Then Grace said:
“There’s something else.”
Hawthorne’s board had discovered that Bell received annual consulting payments from a nonprofit organization.
“Which one?”
“Redwood Learning Initiative.”
Victoria stared.
Redwood again.
Amount:
$60,000 per year.
For five years.
Three hundred thousand dollars.
The principal who helped lure Victoria out of the boardroom had been paid by an organization tied to Malcolm’s hidden property.
Victoria looked upstairs.
May you like
The corporate case and school case were no longer touching accidentally.
They were built on the same money.
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