Semua Bab Bound by Fortune :A Scandalous Heir Billionaire Romance : Bab 21 - Bab 30

The Brian Energy boardroom was a mahogany gulch of suppressed tension. New York city stretched out in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows, a glittering monument to power focused in this one space. Davidson Ekon took his seat at the table, not at the foot, nor at the head where Joe Brian sat, but directly to Brian's right. The heir's seat.The air vibrated with the unspoken, collective memory of the most recent coup attempt. The board members—Wall Street predators, old money types, industry icons—viewed him differently now. No longer did they behold a scandalous sideshow. They viewed the man who stood shoulder to shoulder with Brian and took down Victor Brandt. Respect existed, but it was guarded, tentative, and laced with a profuse amount of fear.Brian called the meeting to order without fanfare. "The Brandt assets are in the process of being integrated. The market has settled down. Now, we look to the future." His gaze swept the room, cold and commanding. "The next move is Angola.

The penthouse, though in its own glory, had now become a world of two. A collectively constructed fortress. The "Ekon Play" had won Davidson his place in company lore, but outside these walls the world remained broken. The signed custody agreement hung there, spectral at their banquet, a chill reality no amount of market triumph or couples' nights could quite dispel.Davidson rested against the windowpane, seven days after the gala, as the city lights grew soft under the rain. He'd been browsing on his phone—stealthy photos taken by a watched nanny Melissa had, begrudgingly, reluctantly hired. Jake at a school fair. Sarah with her nose in a book. Their lives were moving on, a movie he could watch from a distant, expensive seat.He felt Joe’s presence before he heard him. A warmth at his back, a hand coming to rest on his hip.“You’re thinking of them,” Brian said. It wasn’t a question.“Always,” Davidson replied, his voice quiet. He didn’t turn around, leaning back into the solid comf

The word hung in the penthouse air, seismic and absolute. Married.It wasn't a proposal. It wasn't a suggestion in the romantic sense. It was a strategic nuclear option. The final checkmate to the game they were playing. A public, legal, and utterly unignorable declaration that would incinerate the rumors, silence the board, and rewrite the story from "scandalous affair" to "power couple."Davidson could only stare, wind pulled from his chest. Anger at the fight with Simmons was lost, forgotten in a dizzied, vertiginous sense of the chasm they stood balanced on the brink of."Married," he repeated, the word a heavy, alien thing on his tongue."It is the one thing they can't counteract," Brian said, his tone subdued now, thoughtful. He moved slowly, the general charting his final, decisive campaign. "A domestic partnership, a corporate union of souls—it is a reality they must come to terms with. It validates you in a way no title ever could. It makes you untouchable. It makes us untouc

The quiet that enveloped them when the SUV's engine died was not so much an absence of sound. It was a tangible thing, massive and ancient, pressing down upon them with a weight that was both profound and humbling. Coming after the steady, customized roar of New York and the tense, metallic shriek of the airplane, this complete silence was a system shock. Davidson's ears rang with the ghost of the city, struggling to adjust to a world in which the loudest noise was the gentle slap of water on a rocky shoreline and the distant, plaintive cry of a bird.He struggled out of the car, the gravel beneath his feet a rude intrusion. The air was knife-cold and shockingly clean, scented with pine, wet stone, and a crisp, mineral tang from the lake. It was like ice water to inhale, scouring his lungs of penthouse recirculated air.Brian was already out, his head back, inhaling deeply as if he could draw the silence into his lungs. The change in him was immediate and palpable. The rigid set of hi

Jake's rock sat on Joe Brian's desk in the penthouse study. An impossible paperweight. Its quiet, daily presence reminded them of the new rules they were writing, a physical reminder of the life Davidson was bringing into their world of high-risk transactions.The transition was delicate but seismic. Where Davidson had once been the genius to be tested, he was now a peer to whom counsel was sought. Brian did not simply give him assignments; he ran the entire strategy through him. The morning briefings with Alan Price were a council of war of three.The Australians are getting restless," Price told him one morning, indicating a pressure point on a world supply map. "Their new minister is a nationalist. He's threatening to renegotiate the long-term liquefied natural gas contracts.""Let him talk," Brian replied, taking a sip of his espresso. "He's posturing for his constituents. His economy operates on our checks. He'll fold." He turned to Davidson. "What's your read?It was no longer a