Page 152 of Twisted Knight

And fuck if I don’t like her more because of it.

It backfired, Audrey.

Fucking backfired.

FORTY-NINE

Rowan

Days are ticking by.

One after another after another.

At the start of this whole takeover, I had figured I’d have a game plan by now. No, it wouldn’t be finding some poor sap to marry so that I could meet my gran’s impending timeline. Although, yes, that would prove handy and allow me to eventually gain the money needed to buy out other minority owners (after the two-year “stay married” statute took hold), it would do nothing for me in the immediate future.

I can’t buy out other people’s holdings and add to my growing majority if I don’t have the kind of cash it takes to do that. A cool thirty mil would solve a lot of problems, problems I never envisioned I’d ever have, but that’s not going to happen.

But I’ll take the board seat and the 1 percent that Holden is granting me. That percentage, added to mine and the amount Gran has, will make me the second largest shareholder of TinSpirits. With Holden on my side, Rhett will have no other option but to kowtow on decisions or be overruled.

Both scenarios will bruise his fragile, entitled, unchecked ego. And I’m all for it.

The name on my screen when my cell rings brings a smile to my face. I hastily rise from my desk and shut my office door before answering it.

“Rowan here,” I answer in my most businesslike voice.

Holden’s rumbling chuckle over the connection has goosebumps on my skin. “God, I love when you talk to me in that professional, prissy tone, Sunshine.”

“Good morning … or I guess it’s afternoon where you are,” I say, looking at the clock and realizing the time difference in London, where he’s currently off conquering the world.

“It is. I’m jet-lagged as fuck though.”

“Poor baby,” I coo.

“I’m not complaining in the least,” he murmurs. And I know what he’s thinking about. The night before last. My Jacuzzi. Then his mouth driving me insane as I lay out on the pool deck until the stars I was seeing outshone the ones in the sky.

A little pre-trip pussy were his words.

I called it another day in his make-up-to-Rowan tour.

“Good. You shouldn’t be.” I smile.

“The office is good? No one is going off the rails?”

“You already know the answer to that. Audrey’s anywhere and everywhere.”

“That’s what I like to hear.” He pauses. “And the paperwork? Your lawyer received it?”

“She did, and she’s made a few changes to it,” I say.

“Of course she has.”

I can’t tell if he’s irritated or not by what my lawyer redlined. Just seeing the legal documents naming him as the majority owner of TinSpirits—even when I knew it was coming—was hard enough. The newly added addendum naming me as a recipient of a board seat and an allocated percent of ownership when the deal closes even more so.

My dream of being the CEO one day now feels nearly impossible.

I shove down the emotions, blink away the tears, and nod in resolve.

It may not be exactly what I’ve always dreamt of, but I’m at least securing a better position for myself.