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2026-05-15 19:34:09
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Reborn as the True Billionaire 125
Morana’s POVDr. Storms ran the Friday board meeting without me for the first time in months. I found out how it went from a text summary Felix sent afterward instead of sitting through it myself and something about that felt like an actual milestone worth acknowledging.She handled the Hendricks acquisition question better than you would have. Don’t tell her I said that. Felix texted.I heard that, came Yemi’s response in the same thread, apparently added by Felix without my knowledge. And thank you, I think.I set the phone down and looked at Tristan across the kitchen island, where he was reading something on his own phone with an expression that suggested Reid had sent something equally reassuring.“Rothschild’s quarterly numbers came in,” he said. “Reid presented them himself. Investors didn’t ask a single question about my absence.”“Should we be offended by that?”“Deeply offended,” he said, not looking up. “Apparently we’re replaceable.”“Apparently we built something that do
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Morana’s POVHe knocked, which was ridiculous because it was his own penthouse. I was standing in the living room when I heard it and for a full three seconds I genuinely didn’t understand what was happening until I looked through the peephole and found Tristan Rothschild standing in the hallway outside his own front door holding a single flower like he wasn’t entirely sure what to do with it.I opened the door and just looked at him.“You knocked” I stated the obvious. “It’s a first date,” he said, entirely serious as though this explained everything. “I thought the door should be part of it.”“You live here.”“I’m aware.”I looked at the flower. It was not a bouquet. Not the dozen roses I half expected given his general approach to grand gestures. Just one flower, something pale and slightly crumpled at the edges like it had survived a journey it wasn’t fully prepared for.“Is that a carnation?” I tried to hide my smile. “It’s whatever was closest to the register.”“You panicked
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Morana’s POVDr. Patricia Hale’s office was smaller than I expected, warm in a deliberate way that felt designed to counteract exactly the kind of controlled composure both Tristan and I brought into every room we occupied professionally. Two chairs angled toward each other instead of a couch, which felt oddly more intimate than I’d anticipated.I sat with my hands folded in my lap, aware of exactly how corporate my posture looked and glanced at Tristan beside me, who’d adopted the same careful stillness he brought to board meetings, jaw set, expression unreadable.“Neither of you needs to perform anything here,” Dr. Hale said, watching us both with the particular patience of someone who’d clearly seen this exact tension in every powerful couple who’d ever walked through her door. “This isn’t a negotiation. There’s no outcome you need to secure.”“Old habits,” I said.“Understandably.” She had a legal pad in her lap, though she wasn’t writing yet, just watching us both with an attenti
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Tristan’s POVShe fell asleep on the couch around nine, the exhaustion of the last few months finally catching up with her all at once. I sat across from her for a long time just watching her breathe, the tension she’d been carrying in her shoulders for weeks finally releasing into something that looked like actual rest.I’d been sitting on this for three weeks. Not because I was afraid to say it. I’d never been afraid of much, not in the way that stopped me from acting once I’d decided something mattered. I’d been waiting because the timing had never been right because there was always another crisis stacked behind the last one, Xavier’s sentencing bleeding into Iris’s revelation bleeding into the courthouse and the press and eleven patients’ families who deserved answers before either of us could think about anything else.Tonight was quiet for the first time in months. No board meetings tomorrow that required either of us personally. No press circus or legal filing waiting on a si
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Morana’s POVIris caught me in the corridor outside the courtroom, waiting near the elevators while Tristan spoke with our legal team a few feet away, close enough to notice but far enough to give me space if I wanted it.“Can I have a minut?” I glanced at Tristan. He’d already seen her approach, his attention shifting even mid-conversation and I gave a small shake of my head that meant I was fine, that this didn’t require intervention. He held my gaze a moment longer than necessary before returning to the legal team though I knew he wasn’t actually listening to them anymore.“I don’t have anything to trade this time” Iris said, reading the wariness I hadn’t fully hidden. “No documents. No leverage. I’m cooperating fully with the prosecutors on my own charges. Whatever comes for me now, I’ve already accepted it.”“Then what is this?”She wrapped her arms around herself, the grey coat swallowing her thinner frame and looked genuinely uncertain for the first time since I’d known her.
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Morana’s POVThe courtroom was fuller than the arraignment had been, every seat in the gallery occupied and a line of press credentials stretched down the hallway outside. Sentencing day had a different weight than everything that came before it. Arraignments were procedural. Sentencing was an ending.I wore navy this time instead of black, something Catherine had chosen for me specifically because she said black read as performance and navy read as certainty and certainty was what I needed the room to feel when I stood to speak.Tristan sat directly behind me in the gallery, close enough that I could feel his presence without needing to turn around and confirm it. Theodore was beside him. Felix on the other side, uncharacteristically quiet, his usual commentary absent in a way that told me even he understood the weight of what this particular morning required.Iris was three rows back. I hadn’t expected her. She’d flown back voluntarily to face her own charges and I understood from m
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Morana’s POV“This is my husband, Tristan Rothschild” I said and watched the color literally drain from their faces.Tristan didn’t stand up. He just turned his head slightly and looked at each of them in turn with the kind of expression that suggested he was calculating exactly how much they were
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Tristan’s POVI was waiting outside City Hall when the Rolls-Royce pulled up. I didn’t recognize the car at first. I just knew it was the kind of vehicle that made people stop and stare because it screamed money in a way that was impossible to ignore. The engine shut off and I watched the door ope
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Tristan’s POVReid was waiting when I got to the office. He didn’t have the usual morning briefing energy. He had the energy of someone who’d been awake for thirty-six hours straight staring at data that didn’t add up in a way anyone wanted it to.“Xavier met with Vance Mortaine yesterday,” he said
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Tristan’s POV The deal closed at 6:47 on a Saturday morning. I know the exact time because my assistant sent the confirmation while I was still in the car heading to the office and I read it once then put my phone face down on the seat. Four billion dollars for Veltane Pharmaceuticals. We have h
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