The Shadow Tycoon
Copyright© 2026 by CaffeinatedTales
Chapter 57: An Unwanted Introduction
If Jorgreman merely didn’t know that Johnson was about to introduce him to a nobody, then Johnson himself sat beside William looking as though he had just eaten something foul.
There was disgust.
There was revulsion.
There was regret.
There was a petty irritation he couldn’t quite put into words.
And above all, there was naked contempt.
Under normal circumstances, how could the Director of a Tax Bureau possibly waste his time introducing important contacts to a nobody like William?
Especially after William had effectively punched him in the face, leaving the entire tax system, from top to bottom, reeling from the fallout.
Michael most of all.
Just the previous night, word had already come down from the state office.
Given the mounting public pressure, senior leadership intended to sacrifice Michael.
During a conference call, the Chief of the state office repeatedly emphasized the leadership’s position.
It was not that senior leadership abandoned subordinates whenever trouble appeared.
They never had.
Nor did they think such behavior worthy of them.
The IRS had stood toe-to-toe with armies before. It had never learned the meaning of surrender.
The problem was that when the people below dirtied themselves badly enough, even senior leadership could no longer clean up after them.
At that point, no one could blame the people above for becoming ruthless.
The state office had already hinted as much to Johnson.
Make William a criminal.
As quickly as possible.
After all, it had been Sabine City’s IRS that first claimed William might be a criminal, and the person most responsible for that theory was Michael himself.
Johnson personally suspected William wasn’t entirely clean.
But suspicion was one thing.
Evidence was another.
From every angle currently available, William had committed no obvious crime.
His company’s books had been inspected.
His warehouse had been searched.
Nothing unusual had been found.
The reason public opinion remained inflamed was precisely because William appeared innocent.
Combined with the previous enforcement scandals, most of them involving the FBI and amplified by various interested parties, the situation had snowballed into what it was today.
If William could somehow be branded a criminal, most ordinary citizens would instantly lose their sense of identification with him.
The Baler Federation loved calling itself a champion of human rights.
Yet people treated criminals in ways that had very little to do with human rights.
Public attitude determined the direction of events.
Almost nobody would willingly fight for justice on behalf of a criminal.
But a week had already passed.
The Sabine City IRS and the FBI had joined forces.
The two most powerful federal agencies in the Federation had thrown everything they had at William.
And still they had failed to add a single criminal label to his name.
The embarrassment among senior IRS leadership was profound.
If their subordinates couldn’t handle something this simple, what exactly were they capable of doing?
To be fair, the agencies themselves weren’t entirely to blame.
The entire country was watching William.
The slightest procedural mistake in the process of proving him a criminal could make the political situation even worse.
As a result, senior leadership reached a different conclusion during the conference call.
If Michael could not be saved, then Michael would have to take the fall.
Besides, both Michael and the Sabine City IRS shared responsibility for the mess.
First, the local IRS had demonstrated poor judgment.
Second, Michael himself was riddled with problems.
His temper was notorious.
He routinely exploded during investigations.
Targets, colleagues, civilians, it made little difference.
Once his temper flared, everyone suffered.
The current scandal was directly connected to that behavior.
Without sufficient evidence, he had repeatedly treated William as a criminal suspect.
He had assaulted him.
Harassed him.
Escalated the situation until it became a national embarrassment.
Now he would pay for it.
At the same time, the state office instructed the Sabine City IRS to begin repairing relations with the victim.
If they couldn’t knock William down, then they needed to stand beside him.
At least that way they might recover a few points of public goodwill.
Pride?
The IRS was one of the Federation’s most important institutions.
What did an individual’s dignity matter compared to that?
Meanwhile, senior leadership had already begun promoting an alternative narrative.
Coincidentally, it was almost identical to the version William had suggested during his meeting with Johnson at the chop house.
If Michael was going to become the scapegoat, then the story would be tailored to fit him perfectly.
No loose ends.
No path to redemption.
And if the people below failed to support that narrative properly, then the next sacrifices would be the leadership of the entire Sabine City IRS.
At this point, the future was no longer something a local Tax Bureau Director could influence.
Johnson could only obey.
That morning he had called William.
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