Page 66 of Titus

I ignored the fact that his brain had misfired and that he had, in the moment, lost his sense of professionalism. Feeling that he could address me so familiarly at a time like this was the least of the reasons I wanted to drill the son of a bitch.

“You discussed Maldives acquisitions with a woman who dates investment reporters,” I said, my voice lethally calm as I cut him off. “And somehow your defense is that you didn’t leak it explicitly?”

Nobody in the room moved.

The executive swallowed hard. “I believed the environment was private.”

I almost laughed. Private? Jesus Christ.

“You believed,” I repeated slowly, “that discussing my billion-dollar acquisitions in a public restaurant while trying to impress a woman…” I paused, leaning forward slightly, “…was private?”

The man’s face drained of all color because he knew embarrassment was the least painful thing awaiting him today.

I glanced toward my head of legal. “Effective immediately, revoke all access credentials tied to his department.”

“Titus, allow me to explain…”

“No.” That single word silenced the room instantly.

I watched as the man’s eyes filled with tears and noticed the wedding band on his finger.

“I need this job,” he choked out.

“For what reason?” I questioned him, pointedly looking at his wedding band. “Providing for your wife, perhaps children? Or for taking free vacations and fucking a random woman because you wanted to feel important for one evening?”

He instantly covered his left hand. “That’s not⁠—”

“Now you can get a sense of what it feels like to be completely irrelevant,” I said as I stood up to leave the room. “Maybe you and your wife can exchange stories about that feeling, since it’s exactly what you did to her when you pulled this stunt on my company.”

That evening, I welcomed the reprieve of having drinks alone in one of the lounges at my hotel. I’d even considered finding some woman to fuck just to get the poisonous anger from today’s events out of my system, but with my mind somehow held captive by Catalina these days, I knew it wouldn’t be worth it or help matters.

Hell, it would probably just have me wondering what it was like to be with her, and I didn’t need those thoughts swimming around in my head while I was indulging myself.

Shit. I needed a goddamn drink. It only took that bastard cheating on his wife and threatening my Maldives purchase to finally remove the challenges I had been trying to overcome with Cat. She had been out of my mind for most of the day.

As if the annoying, intrusive thoughts from today weren’t enough, I spotted the fucking weasel responsible for putting me in the rejection crosshairs of Ms. Veléz.

Seeing Jameston in my hotel’s VIP lounge nearly made me laugh at the irony of it all. I ordered a double from my staff and watched him carrying on in an overly zealous conversation with a group of people I barely recognized—though I was sure the only reason he’d been admitted into my building was that they happened to be VIP guests of mine.

Why the fuck was he even here? The man hated everything Hawk Enterprise stood for, yet there he sat in my private members’ lounge, drinking eighteen-year Macallan beneath my hotel’s name, embossed on crystal glassware.

What a piece of shit.

I crossed the room with my drink just as he stepped up to the bar. He noticed me approaching and smirked slowly, like being inside my building somehow leveled the field between us.

It didn’t.

“Enjoying the hotel with your friends?” I asked calmly, sliding one hand into the pocket of my slacks.

“Business associates, and yes,” Jameston leaned back in the leather chair. “I’ll admit,” he said casually, “your staff pours a decent scotch.”

I glanced once at the bartender. “Don’t pour him another glass unless he tips you at least fifty percent.”

A couple of men nearby immediately hid their smiles behind their glasses.

Jameston’s jaw tightened.

“Are you always this territorial?” he asked.