“Is there a reason I’m not in this meeting?” I say, voice like ice and steel. “Because last I checked, I’m the lawyer working the Stavros deal.”
Angel leans back in his chair, cool as ever, like he’s watching a Telenovela with popcorn.
“Indeed, you are, niece. We were just clearing up a little personal business.”
Personal?
With Atlas James Stavros?
Hell. No.
My pulse stutters, but I keep my expression blank, the way I’ve been trained since I was old enough to recite contract law.
I cross my arms, standing tall in the doorway of my father’s boardroom like I own the goddamn building—which I should, considering I’ve practically bled for this family.
“Who’s going to fill me in?” I ask, my voice cool, sharp as glass.
A beat of silence.
No one meets my gaze. Not Angel. Not Nico. Not even my own father, who suddenly finds the grain of the polished mahogany table very interesting.
Only he looks at me.
Atlas.
And he doesn’t look away.
He rises from his chair slowly, suit flawless, posture regal, every inch the crowned bastard he was born to be. But his eyes are locked on me, intense and unreadable.
“There’s been a complication,” he begins, voice smooth as silk, but there’s iron beneath the surface. “One of the mines I need access to—the one in the Khamsin corridor—has been seized.”
“By whom?” I ask, chin lifting.
“A warlord,” he answers, eyes never leaving mine. “A petty one. Arrogant, small-minded. He calls himself the General and has declared himself ruler of the region and insists on negotiating in person.”
I frown. “And this is relevant to me how?”
He gives me the smallest smile—just a flicker—and then drops the bomb.
“Because he wants to secure our cooperation with a marriage alliance. To his daughter.”
“What?”
“A European royal—even an ex-prince, an abolished one, many years removed from the monarchy, is valuable to him.”
My stomach turns.
“So why don’t you marry her then?” I snap, even though the idea of him marrying anyone makes me want to vomit.
He stands facing me.
“She’s sixteen years old,” he adds, voice low but deadly. “And I don’t marry children.”
The room falls into silence.
I can feel it like a weight in the air—every man here holding their breath.
I don’t move.
