Page 12 of The Rival's Obsession
But he doesn’t care. He never fucking does.
“Why waste our time if you don’t have someone set?” he goes on, louder now. “And good fucking luck finding someone who can run this place better than we have.”
It isn’t bravado. Not exactly.
It’s conviction. That quiet, reckless certainty that’s always made him dangerous.
He starts toward the exit.
The room stiffens.
“We’re assessing options,” one of the board members calls after him.
He doesn’t stop walking.
And that—that silence—says everything.
They don’t have someone. Not yet.
Which means this isn’t done. Not completely.
But then the board member keeps going:
“Regardless of that outcome, the board will not be transferring the controlling shares in two weeks’ time.”
A direct blow, but Dante doesn’t even flinch.
He reaches the door, one hand already on the handle.
“Then we have two weeks,” he says without turning around.
And just like that, he’s gone.
No rebuttal. No negotiation. Just a declaration.
Two weeks.
It’s a line in the sand, and it’s exactly what I feared.
Because if we couldn’t figure out how to run this firm together in five years, there’s no fucking way we’ll do it in fourteen days.
Hell, at this rate?
Two weeks may as well be two minutes.
It still won’t be enough.
The SUV hums through midtown, a quiet bubble of leather seats and tinted windows between me and the rest of Manhattan’s chaos.
Across from me, Frankie Lane is dressed like a retro ad for heartbreak and vengeance—red lips, winged liner sharp enough to slice a man open, and a pinstriped pencil skirt that somehow makes her fury more efficient.
She’s swiping through slides on her tablet like each one has personally offended her.
“This is a multibillion-dollar contract,” she says without looking up. “With the richest man in Manhattan. I swear to God, if you freelanced anything without telling Grant?—”
“Relax.”
Her gaze snaps to me. “Dante.”
