The Almighty Dominance (by Sunshine) novel Chapter 687

Alex looked at Grandmother Marta.

"You're right," he said. "I'm not going to tell you who I am. That's not relevant to this meeting." He leaned forward slightly.

"What's relevant is that the trust instrument says Feby gets her money. You've been withholding it for fourteen months past the legal trigger date. In that time, the estate has continued to generate returns which have been administered by the co-administrator structure — which means by your family. Every month of delay is a month of returns that should have been accessible to Feby and weren't." He paused.

"I'm not a lawyer. But I've read the documents, and from where I'm sitting, this looks less like prudent management and more like four years of spending someone else's money and finding reasons not to give it back."

The silence was absolute.

Leon broke it first, and the friendliness in his voice had thinned considerably. "That's an extraordinary accusation."

"It's not an accusation," Alex said. "It's a description of what the documents show. If it's inaccurate, produce the accounting. Full accounting, every quarter since Edmund Steinmeyer's death, every disbursement, every return, every administrative f*e."

He looked around the room pleasantly. "I'll wait."

Nobody moved.

What happened next happened quickly.

Adeline turned to Feby with the expression of a woman abandoning a strategy and reaching for a different one.

"Febyella. I understand you're in a difficult position. You're newly engaged, you have a man who clearly cares very much about your financial interests — " her eyes moved to Alex with a meaning she didn't bother to disguise — "and I understand why that might feel supportive. But this man has been in your life for three days. Three days, Febyella. And he is sitting in our family home telling us that we have stolen from you. Can you believe it?"

Feby said, "I didn't say that."

"He did. On your behalf." Adeline's voice softened further, which made it harder.

"Sweetheart, I have to ask. Do you know anything about this man? Do you know where he actually came from? Do you know what he wants?" A pause, precisely placed.

"Because from where I sit, this rude man who appears in your life the same week as the quarterly meeting — is not a fiancé. He's a problem. He wants your money."

Rael added, gently: "Febyella, we're not saying you did anything wrong. We're saying you may have been taken advantage of. The kindest thing we can do is ask him to leave so we can speak privately."

Leon, from his chair, looked at Alex with the expression of someone who expected him to stand up.

Alex did not stand up.

He looked at Feby.

Feby looked back at him. The bruise on her jaw from two nights ago had yellowed at the edges. She had the expression of someone who had been in this room before, in different versions of this conversation, for four years, and had always left with nothing.

She turned to her mother.

"He's my fiancé," she said. "He stays."

Adeline's face did something complicated. "Febyella — "

"He stays," Feby said again. Her voice had the quality of something that had been heated and cooled into a new shape.

Grandmother Marta looked at Alex for a long moment. Something had shifted in her expression — not retreat, not yet, but the specific recalibration of someone who has realized the terrain is different from the map.

"Mr. Leonhart," she said finally. "Let us speak plainly."

"Please," Alex said.

"The estate is complex. There are genuine entanglements that the documents alone don't reflect. We are not thieves. We are a family managing a difficult situation that we did not choose."

She folded her hands. "What we are proposing — the certification requirement — is not a punishment. It is a protection. Febyella would be managing a very large sum of money. She would be a target. The certification provides her with the institutional standing to defend herself."

"From whom?" Alex asked.

A pause. "From people who might want to take advantage of her."

"People like you or people like me," Alex asked.

Marta’s eyes flashed with anger as she jabbed a finger at him. “Of course it’s people like you! We’re his family—the last people she should ever have to worry about!”

"That's what you mean," he said, without heat. "You're worried that if Feby gets access to her inheritance, a man you don't know will have access to a woman with a very large sum of money. That's the concern."

Another pause. Then, carefully: "It is one of the concerns."

Alex nodded. He sat back. He looked at the ceiling for a moment, as if doing arithmetic.

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify