Julian Croft

CHAPTER FOUR 

DANTE'S POV 

"You manage capital like a terrified accountant," I said, tossing my pen onto the scattered financial documents covering the desk. 

"If we follow your strategy, Meridian Ventures survives for another six months before dying a slow, miserable death. It is completely uninspired."

We had been arguing for three consecutive hours. 

The clock on my laptop read four in the afternoon, meaning we had exactly eight hours left to submit a unified restructuring pitch to the Vanguard board. 

The suite felt increasingly stifling, the atmosphere was filled with unresolved hostility and the frustrating reality that Soren Kade was entirely immune to intimidation. 

Soren did not raise his voice, nor did he react to my blatant insult. 

He sat perfectly straight in his chair, spinning a silver pen between his long, calculative fingers while staring at a digital spreadsheet. 

"I manage capital with the intention of retaining it," Soren corrected, his tone was maddeningly even. 

"Your aggressive expansion model requires leveraging assets we do not actually possess. You are pitching a fantasy to the investors, Dante. I am pitching reality."

Hearing him say my first name sent an unexpected jolt straight through my chest, which disrupted my focus for a minute. 

He usually stuck to my surname, maintaining the formal boundaries of our families' twenty-year war. 

Hearing him cross that line, using that calm, authoritative voice, was incredibly distracting. 

I pushed away from the desk and stood up, running both hands through my hair to vent the excess energy boiling under my skin. 

I could not stay in this confined space with him for another minute without losing my temper completely. 

"Pack your laptop," I ordered, grabbing my jacket from the bed and sliding it on. "We are relocating to the business lounge. I need caffeine, and I need to look at a wall that does not have your face in front of it."

Soren stopped spinning his pen, assessing me with a quiet, analytical stare before calmly closing his computer and slipping it into his leather messenger bag. 

He did not argue or complain about the disruption, simply standing up and following me out the door. 

We navigated the sprawling campus pathways toward the central student hub, the late afternoon wind blew harshly through my clothes. 

Blackridge was swarming with elite students finishing their preliminary seminars, congregating in small, exclusive groups across the manicured lawns. 

The moment we pushed through the glass doors of the business lounge, the ambient noise in the room noticeably dropped. 

I ignored the sudden shift in atmosphere, walking directly to an empty corner table and dropping my bag onto a chair. 

Soren took the seat opposite mine, pulling his laptop out and opening it without acknowledging the dozens of eyes tracking our every movement. 

The university population was practically filled with curiosity, watching the heirs of two warring financial empires casually sit down to work together. 

I went to the espresso bar, ordering two black coffees and bringing them back to the table, sliding one across the polished wood toward him. 

"I did not ask for coffee," Soren said, looking at the cup.

"Consider it an investment in keeping you awake," I replied, taking a long drink from my own cup. The bitter, scalding liquid hit my stomach, finally giving me a momentary rush of focus. "Now, pull up the fourth-quarter deficit report. If we restructure the debt into high-yield bonds, we can bypass your ridiculous liquidation strategy entirely."

Soren opened his mouth to dismantle my argument, but a sudden, confident voice interrupted us before he could speak. 

"Well, this is absolutely fascinating," Alessia Moreau announced, stepping up to our table with an amused smile playing on her lips. 

I leaned back in my chair, looking up at the daughter of the wealthiest fashion mogul in Europe. Alessia thrived on social leverage, knowing exactly who held power and how to manipulate campus dynamics to her advantage. 

"Alessia," I greeted, gesturing vaguely to the empty chair beside me. "Are you here to critique our financial models, or are you just contributing to the campus surveillance?"

"A little bit of both," Alessia said, resting her hands on the back of the chair without sitting down. "The entire student body is currently placing bets on the two of you. The odds are heavily favoring a physical altercation before the end of the week, though a few ambitious students are betting you both get expelled by tomorrow morning."

Soren typed a final command into his keyboard, his attention never wavering from the screen. "They are going to lose their money."

Alessia shifted her gaze toward him, her smile widening. "You sound very confident about that, Soren. Especially considering you are currently failing to submit your Vanguard preliminary document."

I frowned, setting my coffee down. "How do you know about our document status?"

"Because everyone in the Vanguard Initiative knows," Alessia explained smoothly, pulling her phone from her pocket and tapping the screen. "Professor Thorne made the submission dashboard public. Every team can see who has locked in their strategy. You two are the only directors left with a blank file, which is exactly why I came over here."

I felt a sudden rush of genuine pressure. 

The deadline was closing in, and our refusal to compromise was broadcasting our dysfunction to the entire program. 

"We are finalizing the details," I said defensively, picking up my pen and pulling a notepad closer. 

"You better finalize them quickly," Alessia advised, taking a step back from the table. "Julian Croft is currently sitting in the upper lounge, bragging to anyone who will listen that his team has already secured a flawless restructuring plan. He is hosting a private party at his off-campus penthouse tonight to celebrate his inevitable victory."

"Julian is a moron," I countered quickly. "His strategy will fall apart the second the investors question his margins."

"Perhaps," Alessia agreed, her eyes gleaming with mischief. "But his party guest list includes three junior partners from Meridian Ventures' original creditor firm. If you want to actually win this assignment, you should probably be at that penthouse tonight."

She offered a brief, elegant wave, turning around and disappearing into the crowded lounge. 

I stared after her, processing the information rapidly. 

Access to the original creditors would give us an unbelievable advantage, allowing us to bypass the theoretical numbers and acquire actual historical data. 

But attending a party hosted by Julian Croft was a social nightmare, especially when my co-director despised unpredictable environments. 

I looked across the table, fully expecting Soren to immediately reject the idea of attending a crowded, off-campus event. 

Soren was not looking at his screen anymore. 

He was staring directly at me, his grey eyes carrying a ruthless focused intensity that completely caught me off guard. 

"What time does the party start?" Soren asked in a  deadly calm voice.

I blinked, momentarily thrown by his sudden shift in demeanor. "You actually want to go to a party hosted by the guy you publicly humiliated an hour ago?"

"Julian Croft owns a fraction of the debt that destroyed my family's reputation," Soren stated, closing his laptop with a definitive snap. "I do not care about his party. I care about extracting the names of those creditors, and I am entirely willing to ruin his evening to get them."

The absolute coldness in his delivery sent a dangerous thrill straight through my veins.

He was not a corporate robot following his father's orders. He was a predator, quietly waiting for the right moment to strike. 

"Alright, Kade," I said, with a genuine predatory smile breaking across my face as I stood up. "Let's go ruin Julian's night.”