Page 178 of Vexatious Queen

MARCH 5 – THURSDAY 7:08 PM

Theo

I’d been hoping that sitting in the library would help ease the stress of reading this document, but who was I kidding? It was a mess. I never wanted whoever wrote this to work for my company.

The merger agreement was dense in the way only corporate law ever managed. Pages of representations and warranties, stacked like dominoes, waiting for one wrong word to tip them.

I tracked a paragraph on the screen with my pen, eyes catching on material adverse effect, indemnification survival period, and limitations on liability. Section 4.2 cross-referenced Schedule C, which contradicted Exhibit F unless you read it in conjunction with the disclosure carve-outs buried three subsections down.

Clean on the surface. Sloppy underneath.

It was the exact kind of thing Dad would’ve flagged immediately, redlined to hell, and then rewritten until the other firm hated him but couldn’t argue with the result. I made notes in the margin, adjusting termination triggers, tightening the language around post-close obligations, wondering whether the other side was incompetent or just hoping no one was paying close enough attention—because this was a disaster and I was paying attention.

After Dad was shot, I tripled the number of hours I put in at the firm. I worked during class and after class, and I went into the office four nights a week. Liam was worried. I saw it in his eyes. Ren was, too, but both of them were trying to be respectful and let me handle my business, which I appreciated.

I used to love interning, but now everything felt off. Like I was stepping into a skin that no longer fit. Dad’s desk still carried the faint scent of his cologne, and his name was stamped on documents that I was now responsible for understanding, protecting, fixing, and secretly signing.

Luckily, Mr. Spector, always double checked every document. That meant he gave me a buffer of error. So far, there’d been none, but the pressure to hide how broken my father was weighed heavily around my neck.

I’d always trusted contracts because they were controlled, predictable, and something you could dismantle clause by clause until nothing was left unexamined. Even the certainty of legal language couldn’t quiet the static in my head. I kept thinking about how easily things could be destroyed, how one moment rewrote everything that came after.

I caught myself rereading the same paragraph for the third time, pen pointing at a random line, and exhaled through my nose. I could hold this together. I had to. That was what planners did—stepped in when the system broke and pretended they weren’t breaking right along with it.

Ever since New Year’s, I’d felt disjointed, like I was standing half a step outside my own life, watching it without quite knowing where I fit anymore. Walking away from Harvard had been the right choice—I knew that on a rational level—but the conversation with the dean still burned. The disappointment had been heavy in his voice as if I’d squandered something sacred.

It hurt more than I wanted to admit, not because I doubted the decision, but because it marked the first time the path I’d mapped so carefully had simply…vanished.

Everything on my screen began to blur into something abstract, and the language lost its sharp edges as my thoughts drifted. Ren sat beside me, close enough that I could feel the soothing warmth of her through the sleeve of my sweater. Her presence was more grounding than any contract. I realized I didn’t need another plan right now. I just needed her.

“How’s Ivy,” I asked, closing my laptop.

Ren turned to look at me, twirling her pen between her fingers.

“She’s hurt and angry, and honestly, I’m worried. Ivy is always so positive and happy, and to see her so sad…I just wish there was more I could do.”

Cupping her face, I ran my thumb over her cheek, soaking in the softness and the love she naturally exuded like a perfume.

“Zigzag knew the moment he started hacking again that there was a chance of getting caught.”

“I know, but I hate to think that I had something to do with him getting arrested. Picturing him sitting in a cell makes me feel so guilty,” she said.

“We don’t know if it had anything to do with what he did for us. My guess is that this has to do with Christov and the fact that Sabastian found out who Zigzag is to his father.”

“So, you don’t think it was Sabastian’s fault?”

Her eyes turned hopeful.

“I didn’t say that. We don’t know exactly what happened, and we can’t trust either of them right now. But I do put more on the father than the son,” I said, and Ren nodded.

She rubbed her bottom lip. She always thought a situation through and looked at it from all angles. That was part of the reason why I loved her so much.

“How’s Ethan,” she asked, changing course.

“The same. Physically, he’s getting better, but…it’s like his soul is broken. He tries to laugh and smile when Blake and I are around, but you can tell that he’s not really feeling it. He and Mom were so close, despite the issues with Myles’s mom and finding out Lip was his. She could be angry enough to want to stab him and yet would defend him and love him all the same.” I shook my head. “I didn’t realize how special that was. How unique they were, until now.”

Ren grabbed my hand and linked our fingers together.

“You may not realize it, but you have that with Liam. Can you ever see yourself being so angry with him that you’d give up on the two of you?”