BRYAN, Justice.
This case involves the ownership interests in and control of Autauga Automotive, LLC (“Autauga Automotive”), a limited liability company that owns and operates a Ford Motor Company (“Ford”) franchise in Prattville known as Gilmore Ford. Frank A. Moultrie appeals from a judgment of the Autauga Circuit Court holding that the interests of Charles O. Wall II and Moultrie in the profits and losses of Autauga Automotive were 90% and 10%, respectively, but that Moultrie was divested of his 10% interest for failing to pay a required capital contribution.1 We affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand the cause to the circuit court with instructions.
I. Facts and Procedural History
In early 2009, Wall and Jesse Mariner began negotiations to purchase the assets of Gilmore Ford, an existing automobile dealership in Prattville. As part of their planned purchase of Gilmore Ford, Wall and Mariner applied to Ford to become a franchise dealership, but Ford rejected their application because of their lack of experience. On July 8, 2009, Wall and Mariner filed articles of organization for Autauga Automotive, which listed Wall and Mariner as the only members, in the Au-tauga Probate Court. Mariner was named the manager of Autauga Automotive. Wall and Mariner also signed an operating agreement for Autauga Automotive that provided in paragraph IV that Wall and Mariner “agree to share in all post formation capital contributions, profits, and surplus of [Autauga Automotive] according to their percentage of ownership.” Paragraph IV stated that Wall and Mariner each owned an undivided 50% interest in Autauga Automotive. Paragraph VII of the operating agreement, which concerns “Division of Profits and Losses,” provides:
“Each of the owners shall own an interest in [Autauga Automotive] as set forth in Paragraph IV, entitled ‘Capital Contributions,’ except as the same may hereafter vary or change as provided in Paragraph V, entitled ‘Contributions of Additional Capital.’ All profits of [Au-tauga Automotive] shall be shared by each of said members according to the percentage of interest each member owns.”
Paragraph VIII of the operating agreement, which concerns the “Rights and Duties of the Parties,” provides:
“Company decisions and actions shall be decided by a majority in interest of the members, at a meeting regularly called with notice to all members. For purposes of determining a ‘majority in interest’, a member’s interest will be his/her interest in profits and losses as set forth in Paragraph VII, and a major[831] ity will mean fifty-one percent (51%) or more.”
Initially, Mariner contributed $300,000 in capital to Autauga Automotive, and Wall contributed approximately $5,000 in capital with the intention of paying Mariner the rest of Wall’s part of the capital contribution from Wall’s share of the earnings of Autauga Automotive.
At some point before Mariner and Wall formed Autauga Automotive, Mariner and Wall approached Moultrie, who had experience in the automobile-sales industry with other dealerships, to help with their application to become a Ford franchise dealership. According to Mariner, he and Wall offered Moultrie “10% of the company for his signature for Ford.” On July 17, 2009, Wall submitted another dealer application to Ford that indicated that Mariner and Wall each owned a 45% interest in Autau-ga Automotive and that Moultrie owned a 10% interest.2 Ford rejected the application because of Mariner’s “background.” At that point, the parties realized that Mariner could not be involved in Autauga Automotive “on paper,” and they decided that Mariner had to be removed as a member of Autauga Automotive.
On July 20, 2009, Mariner, Wall, and Moultrie signed an amendment to Autauga Automotive’s articles of organization that stated: “[T]he members unanimously voted and have received approval of the Manager for Jesse Mariner to transfer his 50% interest and for Charles O. Wall to transfer 1% of his interest in Autauga Automotive, LLC to: Frank Moultrie.”3 The amendment also provided that Wall replaced Mariner as the manager of Autauga Automotive. At the same time, Mariner, Wall, and Moultrie filed an amendment to Autauga Automotive’s operating agreement that modified paragraph IV of the agreement as follows:
“The undersigned owners agree that Jesse J. Mariner has transferred his 50% interest and Charles O. Wall is transferring 1% of his interest in Autau-ga Automotive, LLC, to Frank Moultrie. As such, the owners agree to share in all post formation capital contributions, profits, and. surplus of [Autauga Automotive] according to their percentage of ownership. The amended ownership interest in the business and company as follows: Frank Moultrie 51% [and] Charles O. Wall 49%.”
According to Mariner and Wall, this agreement was only to placate Ford and their “agreement of men” was still that profits and losses would be split 45%, 45%, and 10%, with Moultrie’s interest in Autau-ga Automotive being only 10%. Wall sent an amended prospective dealership application to Ford on July 27, 2009, that reflected Moultrie’s 51% interest and Wall’s 49% interest. That application was approved.
Because on paper Mariner was no longer a member of Autauga Automotive and because he had contributed a significant amount of capital to Autauga Automotive, Mariner wanted reassurance that he was still “part of the deal.” According to Wall- and Mariner, Moultrie drew up an agreement that was supposed to reflect the actual agreement of the parties, that is, that Moultrie had only a 10% interest in Autau-ga Automotive. That agreement, which was dated August 24, 2009 (“the August [832]*8322009 agreement”) and was signed by Wall, Mariner, and Moultrie, stated:
“Agreement For Purchase of Gilmore Ford Assets & Franchise by Autauga Automotive LLC[.] Autauga Automotive LLC & Jesse Mariner & Charlie Wáll & Frank Moultrie Agree to:
“A Sell 10% of Franchise & Autau-ga Automotive LLC to Frank Moul-trie for $1.00 and other considerations such as franchise approval & guarantees to Ford Motor Co.
“B Frank Moultrie retains the 10% for [five] years & participates accordingly w[ith] any & all profit distributions as 10% owner of Autauga Automotive LLC/Ford franchise.
“C At the end of the [five] years Autauga Automotive, LLC has the option to repurchase Frank Moultrie’s 10% at book value of the LLC & Ford franchise. At the end of the [five] years a condition of the buyout must be that Frank Moultrie is released from any & all guarantees to Ford Motor Co. & Ford Motor Credit and any and all other guarantees associated w[ith] [the] LLC & franchise.”
On September 15, 2009, Wall and Moul-trie signed an application for a wholesale financing and security agreement with Ford, which is essentially a line of credit from Ford to use to purchase inventory for the dealership. On October 1, 2009, Wall and Mariner took out a $200,000 loan from River Bank & Trust for use by Autauga Automotive, and, on the same day, Autau-ga Automotive purchased the assets of Gilmore Ford. Also on October 1, 2009, Wall and Moultrie signed a sales and service agreement with Ford, which established Autauga Automotive as an authorized Ford dealership. In that agreement, Moultrie is recognized as having 51% and Wall 49% of “interest equity voting.”
Although Mariner was not a member of Autauga Automotive, he worked for Gilmore Ford and “ran the sales side of the store” from Autauga Automotive’s purchase of the dealership' until approximately July or August 2010. During that time, Autauga Automotive operated in accordance with the August 2009 agreement. Moultrie did not work at the dealership, and he did not maintain an office at the dealership. Moultrie was supposed to transfer ownership of inventory from his other dealerships and cash to Autauga Automotive in the amount of $1,003,300 as a capital contribution, but he never did so, and he never contributed any other capital.4
In December 2009, Mariner, Wall, and Moultrie attended a year-end tax-planning meeting for Autauga Automotive, along with Annamarie Jones, a certified public accountant hired by Autauga Automotive, and Michael Frakes, the comptroller of Gilmore Ford. Moultrie told Jones that he was not an active member of the business and that he should be allocated only 10% of Autauga Automotive’s profits. Jones asked for documentation to support that division of profits because it was a deviation from the terms of the operating agreement, but no one at the meeting mentioned the August 2009 agreement between Wall, Moultrie, and Mariner. Jones prepared K-l forms for Wall and Moultrie that allocated 90% of the profits of Autau-ga Automotive to Wall and 10% of the profits of Autauga Automotive to Moultrie.
Jones conducted another tax-planning meeting in April 2010. Although Moultrie was invited to this meeting, he did not [833] attend. Wall and Frakes were present at this meeting, and Jones was instructed to make the same allocation of profits and losses as she had made in 2009. Jones again asked for documentation to support this allocation because it was not the allocation provided for in the operating agreement, but Wall told her that he was “getting that.” Jones prepared 2010 K-l forms for Wall and Moultrie that once again allocated 90% of the profits to Wall and 10% of the profits to Moultrie.
By October 2010, Mariner was no longer working at the dealership, and, at that time, Moultrie had replaced Mariner as a guarantor on the $200,000 note Wall and Mariner had executed in October 2009. After Mariner stopped working, at the dealership, Wall and Moultrie began repaying Mariner for the capital he had contributed to Autauga Automotive. In May 2011, Wall and Moultrie signed as guarantors of a $400,000 note they used, in part, to repay Mariner for his capital contribution to Autauga Automotive.
On April 6, 2011, Jones received a call from Vince Studeman, Moultrie’s personal accountant, disputing the allocation of profits and losses in the 2010 tax returns. However, Jones had already given the returns to the parties for filing and, apparently, the 2010 tax returns were not modified before they were filed. In September 2011, Jones attended a meeting with Wall, Frakes, and Moultrie, but the dispute about allocation of profits and losses was not resolved. Jones asked Wall for documentation supporting the 90/10 allocation of profits and losses, but Wall did not tell her about the August 2009 agreement. At this meeting, Moultrie stated that he believed he was entitled to 51% of “everything,” not just capital.
On October 5, 2011, Moultrie went to the Gilmore Ford dealership and asked Wall to sign five signature pages and refused to tell Wall what he was agreeing to by signing those pages. Wall refused to sign the pages and left the premises. After Wall left, Moultrie told Frakes that if Wall did not sign those signature pages by the next morning, he was going to have Wall removed as the manager of Autauga Automotive. Moultrie’s brother eventually emailed Frakes 80 pages of loan documents that were connected to the 5 signature pages. Wall agreed to sign for the loan, which indebted Autauga Automotive in the amount of $800,000 for the benefit of other automobile dealerships that Moultrie was connected to, on the condition that Moul-trie agree to sell his interest in Autauga Automotive. On October 6, 2011, Moultrie signed a letter of intent to sell his “51% interest” in Autauga Automotive to Wall on January 2, 2012, and it indicated that the “agreed buyout amount” would be determined at a later date.
On November 21, 2011, Moultrie sent Wall a “Notice of Special Meeting of Members of Autauga Automotive, LLC.” The meeting was scheduled for December 5, 2011, and Moultrie indicated in the letter that the purpose of the meeting was “to elect a managing agent/member for the next year by a majority vote of the members” and “to discuss any inaccuracies in the tax returns signed by Charles Wall for the comphny, and the manner of correcting any inaccuracies.” Moultrie signed the letter as “Majority Member.”
On December 1, 2011, Wall and Autauga Automotive (hereinafter referred to collectively as “the plaintiffs”) filed a verified complaint in the Autauga Circuit Court seeking a temporary restraining order (“TRO”) and a preliminary injunction “enjoining Moultrie, or anyone acting on his behalf, from holding the meeting of the members and taking the actions set forth” in the notice of the special meeting and “enjoining any additional actions by Moul-trie to sell Autauga Automotive or its as[834] sets or to take any further actions that are detrimental to the best interest of Autauga Automotive, the dealership, or Wall.” The complaint also asked the circuit court to issue a judgment declaring, among other things, that Wall owns a 90% interest in the “profits and losses of Autauga Automotive, [ and that] Wall is the ‘majority in interest’ Member of Autauga Automotive with the right to make decisions as such under the operating agreement.” On December 2, 2011, the circuit court granted the plaintiffs’ request for a TRO. On December 14, 2012, by an agreement of the parties, the circuit court entered an order extending the December 2 TRO until further order of the court.
The following pertinent procedural history was set forth in Moultrie v. Wall, 143 So.3d 128, 182-33 (Ala.2013): ’
“On January 3, 2012, Moultrie filed an answer and a counterclaim. Moultrie alleged, among other things, that Wall had breached fiduciary duties he owed Autauga Automotive as its manager and that Wall had breached the operating agreement of Autauga Automotive. Moultrie also sought a preliminary injunction seeking, among other things, to prohibit Autauga Automotive from paying Wall anything except his monthly salary. Moultrie also moved the circuit court to dismiss any claim brought by Autauga Automotive. In his motion to dismiss, Moultrie alleged that, because Moultrie owned a 51% majority interest in Autauga Automotive, Wall lacked standing to bring suit on behalf of Au-tauga Automotive without Moultrie’s approval or consent.
“On February 13, 2012, Wall filed a petition seeking to hold Moultrie in contempt for violating the terms of the TRO.... Wall requested an award of costs for filing the motion and an award of damages to prevent further violations of the TRO.
“On February 21, 2012, the plaintiffs amended their complaint, adding a claim to enforce a ‘letter of intent’ signed by Moultrie and acknowledged by Wall in October 2011 indicating that Moultrie intended to sell his interest in Autauga Automotive.... On February 27, 2012, the circuit court entered an amended TRO, based on an agreement of the parties, that was to remain in effect pending further order of the court....
“On March 20, 2012, the day before the final hearing in this matter was scheduled to take place, all four attorneys representing Moultrie filed a motion for leave to withdraw from the case. The same day, Wall filed a second petition seeking to hold Moultrie in contempt for violating the TRO and the amended TRO.... The circuit court allowed Moultrie’s attorneys to withdraw and postponed the final hearing that had been scheduled for March 21.
“On May 1, 2012, Moultrie filed a motion seeking the return of funds of Autauga Automotive and a petition seeking to hold Wall in contempt....
“After conducting a hearing, the circuit court entered a judgment on May 29, 2012, finding Moultrie in contempt for violating the TRO and the amended TRO.... In a separate judgment entered on May 29, 2012, the circuit court ■denied Moultrie’s motions seeking the return of funds and his petitions seeking to hold Wall in contempt.
“On June 21, 2012, the circuit court entered a judgment assessing $132,345.57 in attorney fees and costs against Moultrie.”
Frakes testified that, at this point in the litigation, the dealership had been operating below Ford’s minimum capital requirement for months, and, in June 2012, there was a shortfall of approximately $180,000 in the working-capital requirement on Au-[835] tauga Automotive’s financial statement. Frakes and Wall had communicated with Ford about this issue, and they told Ford representatives that they did not want to infuse more cash into the dealership while litigation was pending. According to Frakes, Ford was giving them leeway about providing more capital for the dealership because it thought that the trial in this case was supposed to take place in March 2012 and because Wall had promised to capitalize the dealership once the litigation was over.
However, on July 19, 2012, Wall and Frakes received an e-mail from Autauga Automotive’s Ford credit representative that stated: “Do you know why [Autauga Automotive] shows a negative used equity on the May financial statement? Also, their Net Cash Requirement has increased to over $600,000. This is consistent with the trend from this time last year; however, they have zero internal resources to mitigate the amount.” Frakes and Wall took this message as a clear warning that Ford was about to make a “cash call.”5 Frakes testified that Autauga Automotive needed the additional capital to appear on the July 2012 monthly financial report that he sent to Ford so there was not another report with a large deficit in working capital. Wall and Frakes were able to secure a $250,000 loan, and they received the funds on July 31, 2012. The loan proceeds were not put into an account owned by Autauga Automotive because Frakes and Wall did not want Moultrie to have access to the money; however, the money was in an account accessible to Autauga Automotive and was reported on Autauga Automotive’s July financial statement It is undisputed that no one told Moultrie about the e-mail from Ford that caused Wall and Frakes to borrow money to contribute additional capital to Autauga Automotive.
In August 2012, Moultrie appealed the circuit court’s May 2012 contempt judgment and the June 2012 attorney-fee judgment to -this Court. On September 10, 2012, while Moultrie’s appeal was pending in this Court, the circuit court conducted a bench trial on the plaintiffs’ request for a declaratory judgment and on Moultrie’s pending counterclaim. At that hearing, the plaintiffs introduced a document, which was undisputedly handwritten by Moultrie, that set forth the terms of the August 2009 agreement, quoted above. Although there were signature lines on the document for Moultrie, Wall, and Mariner, there were no signatures on the document submitted as evidence. Mariner testified that Wall, Moultrie, and Mariner had signed the August 2009 agreement. The plaintiffs presented evidence indicating that the signed copy of the August 2009 agreement was kept in Wall’s office at Gilmore Ford; that the August 2009 agreement, along with other company documents, had been stolen from Wall’s office while this litigation was pending; and that the signed copy .of the August 2009 agreement had not been recovered. Trial of the issues could not be [836] completed on that date, and the circuit court entered an order stating that the trial would resume on November 30, 2012.
On September 17, 2012, Wall sent Moul-trie a letter asking Moultrie, pursuant to paragraph V of the operating agreement, to contribute $93,718 in capital to Autauga Automotive in order to maintain his 51% ownership in the assets of Autauga Automotive.6 Paragraph V states:
“The owners may contribute in proportionate amount any additional capital deemed necessary for the operation of [Autauga Automotive], provided, however, that in the event that any member deems it advisable to refuse or fails to contribute his share of any or all of the additional capital, then the other members or any one of them may contribute the additional capital not paid in by such refusing member and shall receive therefor[ ] an increase in the proportionate share of the ownership or interest in the entire company in direct proportion to the said additional capital contributed.”
Wall gave Moultrie 30 days to comply, but Moultrie did not respond to the letter or contribute any capital to Autauga Automotive. Wall sent Moultrie a second letter on October 23, 2012, asking that Moultrie contribute $93,718 in capital to Autauga Automotive by October 31, 2012, and informing him that, if he did not, the capital accounts would be rebalanced so as to divest Moul-trie of his membership interest.
On October 26, 2012, Moultrie filed a motion for a protective order regarding Wall’s request for an additional capital contribution. Moultrie argued that the capital call was improper while litigation concerning the controlling interest of Au-tauga Automotive was pending, that Wall owed money to Autauga Automotive and should not be able to demand a capital contribution from Moultrie, and that Wall failed to call a meeting of the members of Autauga Automotive or otherwise to discuss the cash call issue with' Moultrie before Wall decided a capital contribution by Moultrie was necessary. Wall responded to Moultrie’s motion on October 31, 2012, and asked the circuit court to “ratify the actions of [Autauga Automotive] in reba-lancing the capital accounts of the company in accordance with the provisions of its operating agreement.” The circuit court did not rule on Moultrie’s motion for a protective order on or before October 31, 2012, and Moultrie did not contribute any capital to Autauga Automotive. On October 31, 2012, Autauga Automotive’s capital accounts were rebalanced to reflect that Moultrie had no interest in the capital, profits, or losses of Autauga Automotive.
On November 11, 2012, Moultrie filed a motion to recuse, requesting that the circuit court judge who had presided over this case since its inception recuse himself from the proceedings based on an allegation that the judge, on September 12, 2012, had an improper ex parte communication with a witness who had testified at the September 10 trial. The circuit court denied the motion to recuse on November 19, 2012. On November 20, 2012, the plaintiffs moved for a partial summary judgment, arguing that Wall was entitled to a judgment as a matter of law declaring him the owner of 100% of the ownership or interest in Autauga Automotive in light of Moultrie’s failure to respond to the request for an additional capital contribution.
On November 26, 2012, Moultrie filed in this Court a petition for a writ of mandamus directing the circuit court judge presiding over this case to recuse himself. On [837] November 29, 2012, this Court granted Moultrie’s request for a stay of the proceedings pending disposition of the mandamus petition. On August 30, 2013, this Court denied Moultrie’s petition for a writ of mandamus without an opinion. See Ex parte Moultrie (No. 1120250, August 30, 2013), 170 So.3d 721 (Ala.2013) (table). On September 13, 2013, this Court released its decision in Moultrie’s appeal. See Moultrie v. Wall, 143 So.3d 128 (Ala.2013). We dismissed “Moultrie’s appeal insofar as it relate[d] to the May 29, 2012, contempt judgment or the February 27, 2012, TRO,” 143 So.3d at 136, and we affirmed “the judgment assessing attorney fees and costs.” 143 So.3d at 139.
On October 11, 2013, Moultrie filed a motion requesting permission from the court to depose Wall, even though one day of trial had been completed, because, he said, “new issues” had arisen; specifically, Moultrie stated that he needed to depose Wall concerning Wall’s September 2012 request for additional capital from Moul-trie. On November 8, 2013, the circuit court denied the plaintiffs’ motion for a partial summary judgment because the motion was filed “in the middle of trial.” On the same day, the circuit court denied Moultrie’s request to depose Wall. The circuit court subsequently set a final hearing date of March 10, 2014.
On March 6, 2014, the plaintiffs filed a motion to strike Moultrie’s expert disclosures as untimely. The plaintiffs argued that the circuit court had set an October 31, 2012, deadline for disclosing expert witnesses and that Moultrie should not be permitted to present the testimony of experts who had not been disclosed by that date. At the start of the hearing on March 10, 2014, the circuit court stated that Moultrie’s motion for a protective order, which concerned Wall’s September 2012 request for a capital contribution, was still pending. Counsel for Moultrie stated that the expert Moultrie proposed to call was necessary only if the court was going to allow testimony related to Wall’s re- . quest for additional capital. The circuit court granted the plaintiffs’ motion to strike and stated that any expert disclosed after October 31, 2012, would not be permitted to testify.
Frakes testified at the March 10 hearing that he had not considered that Wall could request that Moultrie contribute 51% of • the capital needed by Autauga Automotive in July 2012 until Moultrie’s counsel asked him that question on the first day of trial on September 10, 2012. Although Frakes had testified at the September 10 hearing about the $250,000 capital contribution that took place after he and Wall heard “things” from Ford “that made us worry [Ford was] going to make a cash call,” Frakes testified in more detail about the cash-call issue at the March 10 hearing. The e-mail from Ford dated July 19, 2012, that convinced Wall and Frakes that Ford was about to make a cash call was introduced into evidence; Moultrie objected because, he said, he had never seen the email and did not know of its existence until the last day of trial. When the plaintiffs offered the September 17, 2012, eapital-contribution-request letter from Wall to Moultrie into evidence, the circuit court granted Moultrie a continuing objection to any testimony or documents related to the cash call that took place after the first day of trial on September 10, 2012. Frakes admitted that paragraph VIII of the operating agreement provided for a meeting among members to discuss decisions related to Autauga Automotive, such as the cash call, and that Wall had not conducted a meeting with Moultrie before requesting a capital contribution from Moultrie. Wall testified that he did not call a meeting with Moultrie before securing additional capital for Autauga Automotive because he was [838] “interested in saving [his] back side” at the time.
At the conclusion of the plaintiffs’ case, the plaintiffs moved to “amend their complaint to conform to the evidence” presented at trial, specifically: that the July 31, 2012, capital contribution was necessary to satisfy Ford, that the request for a capital contribution from Moultrie was made in compliance with paragraph V of the operating agreement, that the time for Moul-trie to respond to the capital call was reasonable, that Moultrie failed to respond, and that, as of October 31, 2012, due to Moultrie’s failure to respond, Wall became the sole owner of Autauga Automotive. Moultrie objected and argued that the motion to amend was not timely and that the plaintiffs had not demonstrated that an additional capital contribution was needed — only that Wall and Frakes feared that one was needed. The circuit court granted the plaintiffs’ motion to amend their pleadings, over Moultrie’s objection.
On March 11, 2014, the circuit court entered a final judgment on all pending claims before the court. The circuit court found that a signed copy of the August 2009 agreement had been stolen from Wall’s office, that the August 2009 agreement provided that Moultrie “was to retain a 10% interest in the business and participate in any profits distribution as a 10% owner,” that the August 2009 agreement modified paragraph VII of the operating agreement, and that the K-l schedules prepared in 2009 and 2010 and “other evidence support Wall’s contention and the court’s finding that Wall had a 90% interest in the profits and losses and Moultrie had a 10% interest in the profits of [Autau-ga Automotive].”
The circuit court also made specific findings of fact about the “cash-call” issue. The court noted that the evidence demonstrated that Moultrie had never contributed any capital to Autauga Automotive; that Moultrie, in May 2012, had expressed concern about Autauga Automotive’s working capital falling below Ford’s guidelines; and that Moultrie was aware of the possibility of a cash call by Ford as early as July 2011. The court stated:
“Since Wall, pursuant to the ‘side agreement’ of August 2009, possesses a 90% interest in profits and losses he made the decision to make a ‘cash call’ on Moultrie pursuant to paragraph V of the operating agreement.