Page 78 of Boardroom Mask

The thought alone makes me want to tear something apart with my bare hands.

I don’t share my belongings. Never have, never will. And Jillian Pierce belongs to me now, whether she’s accepted that fact yet or not. I don’t give a fuck if it’s insane or “too soon” or any of that bullshit. Every moan she’ll ever make in the years to come is for my ears and mine alone. She’ll never claw another man’s back to shreds.

Just me.

Only me.

Even the thought of her cuddling up with Rae makes that jealousy inside me get hot and viscous. But I tamp it back down, force myself to toggle away from the feed, and focus on real work for a while.

Mat’s working on the bylaws. That’s the one thing I’ve got moving in the right direction. A vote of no confidence in the chairman requires a two-thirds majority of the board. That’s eight out of twelve seats. I hold one and my father holds another, so it’s safe to say that’s one vote yes and one vote no. The remaining ten are split between loyalists, fence-sitters, and a handful of “independent” directors who have spent the last decade rubber-stamping whatever Lukas puts in front of them.

On paper, it looks impossible. Lukas built this board to be compliant. He handpicked most of them. They owe him their seats, their bonuses, their memberships at the country clubs and invite-only restaurants they call home. Asking them to vote against him is asking them to bite the hand that feeds.

But Mat sees cracks. He called me this morning, early, before I’d even finished my first coffee.“Three of the independents arenervous,”he said.“They don’t like seeing this father-son schism. Bad for business.”

“Nervous isn’t the same as willing,”I told him.

“No,”he agreed. “But nervous is where willing starts. Give me a few days.”

So I’m giving him a few days. Whether I have that much time to burn before my father catches wind of what I’m up to is another question entirely.

In the meantime, there’s Rae to deal with. She’s back from France, and fuck only knows what my father might’ve done to her there. All I know is that the clock is ticking on whatever sick game he’s playing with her. I can’t control what happens between them behind closed doors—believe me, I’ve tried—but I can at least try to limit her exposure. I have this nasty feeling in my chest where she’s concerned. After all the hell I put her through, the least I can do is try to protect her from the more dangerous Lazarev.

The best thing I can do is create distance between them. It’s half the morning’s work to come up with a vague-sounding “initiative” that will require her time to be spent away from my father’s domain on the fiftieth floor. I pull up my email and start drafting. I add Rae’s name to the first round of staffing reassignments, buried in a list of a handful of other employees so it doesn’t look targeted. The task force doesn’t need to do anything real. It just needs to exist on paper long enough to pull her off my father’s floor and put her somewhere I can keep an eye on her.

I hit send and watch the email disappear into the server. It’s a band-aid on a bullet wound. I know that. But it buys time, and time is the only currency I’ve got left.

When I’m done, I indulge myself by peeking at the cameras again. It’s the same as I left it. Or at least, I think it is—until I see movement at the door.

Jillian storms into the bedroom with a pissed expression on her face. She stops a few feet inside the door and squints around. Her gaze sweeps over every little thing in sight, from bed to bureau to the firmly locked window. My frown matches hers. What’s my little fox looking for?

Then her eyes look straight into mine.

As I watch, she drags the vanity chair across the carpet and climbs up on it. Her face fills the frame.

She’s close enough that the pinhole lens captures every last freckle. Her eyes are forest green and furious, red strands of hair floating across her face, mouth twisted in a scowl. An enraged flush is stealing over her cheeks and collarbone, painting her a perfect shade of pink.

She holds my gaze through the lens for at least five full seconds. Then she reaches into the vent with two fingers, plucks the camera free, and holds it up in front of her face.

It’s battery-powered, so the feed doesn’t die, but it turns into action movie jostling as she drops back down and goes stomping across the room. I get one tiny glimpse of her purse opening before she shoves the camera in, and then there’s nothing but black.

I can only laugh. Seeing her this riled up was fucking priceless. I’m not even bothered; this is just the latest twist in a wrestling match that’s only gotten more fun as we’ve gotten more tangled up in each other. For the first time since my father burst into my office yesterday and tried to outmuscle me, I feel myself smirking.

Your move now, little fox.

What will you dream up this time?

I don’t have to wait long for an answer.

The commotion is faint at first. I hear a raised voice from somewhere beyond the double doors that separate my executive suite from the main reception area. “—don’t care if he’s in a meeting, in a coma, or on the International fucking Space Station. I need to see him. Now.”

I know that voice, both when it’s screaming my name and I know it when it’s telling me to go fuck myself.

My smirk is back. So is my hard-on.

I get up from my desk and move to the door, cracking it open just enough to hear the rest.

“Ma’am, I totally understand, but Mr. Lazarev’s schedule is—” That’s Madison, my new receptionist, Rae Everett’s replacement. She’s twenty-three, blond, and aggressively cheerful, and she treats the front desk like it’s the velvet rope outside a nightclub. Under normal circumstances, nobodygets past Madison without a confirmed appointment and a government-issued ID.