He Chose Her On Our Wedding Night So I Took Everything Chapter 29
Before summer, the fate of Hawthorne Apparel’s defective product lines was sealed.
The company was ordered to continue the recalls, pay hefty fines, and cover all consumer claims.
The altered testing documents and internal approvals moved into criminal proceedings. As the responsible executive, Eric’s ability to sign external business documents was severely restricted.
Several major retailers terminated their partnerships, and creditors moved to take over the company’s remaining assets.
The hole the Hawthorne family had expected Carrington to fill was never filled.
Eric’s father called Vivian one last time.
He brought up the years the two families had known each other and asked her, for old times’ sake, to at least help preserve the Hawthorne name.
Vivian asked him only one question.
“When you expected Elodie to tolerate Madison on her wedding night, did old times matter to you then?”
There was no answer.
After the call, she told me about it.
“If you want to acquire what’s left of their distribution channels, I can have the team put together an evaluation.”
I reviewed the asset list and declined.
“Carrington doesn’t need to buy a pile of assets that don’t fit our strategy just to prove we won.”
Instead, we turned our attention back to the public bidding process for our new contracts.
Several suppliers whose payments had been delayed by Hawthorne submitted proposals.
I didn’t exclude them for having worked with Hawthorne. I only required that their finances, quality control, and performance capacity be independently verified.