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Reed will learn a lesson today; money can’t buy you everything you want. I know that all too well.

Bypassing the reception, I head straight down the corridor toward his office. “Excuse me, you can’t go in there,” one of his minions calls out, but I ignore her and continue on. “I’ll call security,” she declares, and I will it to happen. Let the world see how my father treats me. Let them see the real George Fanzio.

Alejo’s gaze shifts to mine, and I smile back at him. He hates the thought of getting into trouble. At twenty-three years old, he’s been my legal assistant for two years, and I couldn’t be prouder of how far he’s come from the homeless teenager at the shelter I assist at to being well on his way in his dream of becoming a full-fledged lawyer.

Throwing open my father’s office door, I lock eyes with the man I despise. His sadistic eyes flash with surprise before he masks it and huffs at my presence. The room becomes silent as the men take me in, and I ignore the way their eyes roam over me as I pull out a chair at the boardroom table and motion for Alejo to follow.

As my eyes scan the occupants of the table, I ignore the look of horror etched on Reed’s face and the way his perfectly crafted jaw falls open at the sight of me. If I could take a photo of his slackened jaw, wide eyes, and pale face, I would win prizes for the most shocked face caught on camera.

“What the hell are you doing here, Gianna?” My father leans over the table, with malice in his tone, and I refrain from flinching, determined to remain strong under his presence. My stomach turns at the sight of him, and I fight the memories that haunt me.

“This is a board meeting, is it not?” I quip back and open my briefcase, sliding the file out and onto the table, ignoring the anger radiating from him.

The sneer on his lips deepens as he scans over my body and lands on my bump, and bile turns in my stomach at his attention.

A part of me wants to cover the bump despite it being too big to hide, and my fingers itch to rest over the baby, but I refuse to show any sign of weakness.

“I’ve told you before, and I’ll tell you again”—I glower back at my father—“Ridgeway land is not for sale. You can have anything else. Hell, you have everything else. But not this.” I shake my head and point at the paperwork. “I hold twenty-two percent.” I tap the paperwork my father is familiar with but appears to have ignored in his quest to destroy my husband’s legacy. Anger at his underhandedness flashes through me. “It’s not happening.” I push the paperwork in his direction. “Whatever deal you think you’ve signed off on is not legal. End it. Now!” I demand, and stab the file with my finger, while Alejo hands out the contract and proof of my shareholder rights to the other board members.

For years, I’ve left my father alone, allowing him to run his empire with no say from me. To be blunt, I want nothing to do with it or him. But trying to take my children’s future, our community’s future, from them in a bitter bid to control me is too much, leaving me no choice but to step in.

Alberto, my father’s right-hand man, clears his throat. He’s loyal to him to the bone, and he’s also just as bitter, ruthless, and misogynistic, but he knows the legalities of the business by heart, so he knows I’m right. My father can’t sell Ridgeway Common without my say-so.

The vein protruding from my father’s temple looks fit to burst as he glares at me with such contempt I’d fear it if I wasn’t used to it. I’ve spent years shying away from his scorn, but something inside me snapped when I was a teenager, and with the help of my husband, I got away from the man who betrayed me so brutally.

Kevan shifts from side to side, and guilt simmers in his stare. I hide my hands beneath the table and curl them into fists while glaring back at him. He was once my husband’s best friend, but money and power can turn people’s morals, it seems.

Taking a deep breath, I hold my hand out to Alejo, and he slips the small box into my palm. Then, in a move no one sees coming, I throw the box at Kevan’s chest. “If you send me another marriage proposal, I’ll be throwing a restraining order at you instead. Get it into your thick skull, I would not marry you if you were the last man on earth. And to think you called yourself Jaxon’s friend.” Tears swim in my eyes, but I blink them away. Saying his name in Kevan’s presence feels like a dagger to my heart.

“Whose baby is that?” My father’s voice slices through the air like a threat, but it’s always the same; he can never even attempt to hide his disgust in me.

I stare straight ahead. “That’s none of your concern. Are we done here?” I ask Alejo.

“Yes, Mrs. Mathers,” he says, and Reed jolts.

“Another waste of fucking space. Like the last one, then,” he states, and I let him have his dig.

“It appears so.” I smirk toward Reed, who looks like he still hasn’t recovered from the fact I’mnota gold digger, as he so eloquently put it. Nor am I a liar.

“I’ll see myself out.” I rise out of the chair, and my father does too.

“You conniving little bitch. If you think for one minute I’m going to let you get away with this, then you can think again,” he roars, attempting to crawl across the table toward me.

“You left me no choice,” I whisper, then head toward the door, feeling the weight of his words on my way out.

REED

I remain glued to the chair, my head swiveling from one person to the next. “What the hell just happened?” I exhale, flabbergasted at the events.

When she walked through the door with the grace of a ballerina, my jaw almost hit the floor. I was about to close the deal of the fucking century, but all of that was obliterated in a matter of minutes.

Her hair was in soft curls around her delicate face, and it took me a moment to register it was actually her. The bump was a giveaway, proudly pushing against her work blouse as I blinked through the haze of the whooshing sound in my ears.

She held her head high when she delivered her words with careful precision, and what hurt the most was she barely spared me a second glance. She’s clearly done her homework and by now knows who I am. A ripple of anxiety waves through me, but I push it aside while looking around the room for answers. No one is saying a damn thing, the eerie silence filling the atmosphere, and everyone stares at the door she just exited.

Pissed at their lack of a response, I slam my fist onto the table, and their eyes dart toward mine. “What the hell just happened?” I mean, it’s clear what happened; in the bat of her long lashes, she tore up my proposal, destroyed my dreams—years’ worth of plans gone.

Fanzio clears his throat. “My daughter is a bitch.”