Chapter 4 - THE AGREEMENT
The document was called:
ALLIED FAMILY CONTINUITY AND MARITAL GOVERNANCE AGREEMENT.
Thirty-eight pages.
A ridiculous title.
Raymond’s counsel drafted the first version.
Travis said it was about stability if Dad died or became permanently incapacitated.
The structure had three important pieces.
First:
I would place my personally held Fiorentino voting shares into a marital holding entity.
Economically:
Still mostly mine.
Governance:
Shared.
Second:
Travis would receive a durable proxy to vote those shares during periods when I was “unavailable, medically impaired, or acting under material outside influence.”
Outside influence.
I asked:
“Define that.”
The draft did not.
Third:
A Family Alignment Committee would resolve disputes involving major votes affecting Kane and Fiorentino joint ventures.
Three members.
Me.
Travis.
Raymond.
Two against one.
I laughed when I read it.
Travis did not.
“This protects you if your father pressures you.”
“My father does pressure me.”
“Exactly.”
“That does not mean I give your father a vote over me.”
“You’re being emotional.”
I closed the folder.
“No.”
That should have ended it.
Instead, every draft became slightly softer.
Outside influence changed to:
conflict of interest.
Raymond’s permanent committee seat became a five-year transitional seat.
Travis’s proxy became revocable under defined conditions.
The mechanism improved.
The purpose did not.
My assets would move into a system where my husband and father-in-law could outvote me in the name of protecting me from my own father.
I refused every version.
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Then Dad’s recovery became less visible.
Travis’s patience became shorter.
