The Almighty Dominance (by Sunshine) novel Chapter 696

Alex leaned close. His voice was for her alone.

"Take it."

"It's a shell, Alex. They're laughing at me." She could hear it — the little coughs behind hands, the smirk Rael wasn't bothering to hide.

"Let them. A licensed trade seat is a door. Doors matter more than what's behind them." A pause. "Take it in writing. Every share. And this time, I read the pages first."

He looked at her, quiet and level. "Do you have any other choice?"

She didn't. The money was already gone — swallowed by his mother's family, then chased with a lawsuit for good measure. You can't pay back people who took everything and then billed you for the privilege.

Alex started reading the pages. Aloud, where it suited him. He struck one clause that would have quietly kept the trade seat with the family.

Then a second — one that would have draped Rael's personal guarantees over Feby's shoulders like a hand pressing down on her head. He didn't announce what he'd found. He just drew two lines and watched Rael's face confirm the purpose of both.

Feby only saw the pen move. She would never know exactly what he'd just carried off her back.

He laid the deed in front of her. Beside it, a one-page release ending the Rydell co-administration of the Steinmeyer estate. Forever.

"Read it carefully before you sign," he said — clearly, for the whole room, in exactly the voice he'd used the last time. "They are not honest people."

Nobody denied it. Not this time either.

Feby signed. Marta signed. Rael signed with the pen at arm's length, as though the paper might correct him.

On the tram home, Feby watched the amber pulse of the rail run ahead through the dark.

"I own a failing advertising company," she said. "Four years of fighting, and that's my prize."

"You own an advertising company. Failing is a condition. Not a trait."

"Eleven employees who haven't been paid since spring."

"Then pay them Monday. Head Supervisors earn well, I hear." He turned to the window. She waited for more. For once she thought he might actually say it — whatever it was he never said. His jaw shifted. The moment passed. "And keep the name off your face when the announcements come."

Her chest went tight. "What announcements?"

"Regent's," Alex said. "I'm told there'll be two."

There were two.

They landed on the city two mornings later like a change in the weather everyone felt through the walls.

The first: the Regent Group had changed hands. New chairman, name withheld by request. Beatrix Hargrove, the woman who built the company, would stay on as vice chairman and chief executive.

By noon, every tea house, trade floor, and House parlor in New Avalon was chewing on the same bone. Who buys the Regent Group? Who has that kind of gold?

Three Houses publicly denied being the buyer, in tones that begged to be disbelieved.

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