Page 57 of Blind Devotion

“I want eighteen of his thirty-three percent shares sold to me by the end of next week.” Not too much to be suspicious, but enough to get a foot in and put pressure.

This was my in with FinTech, the German tech company I had been in talks with about a purchase for months. I planned onplaying the local aspect with my expansion of a subsidiary of DV Banks in Germany, but this was more propitious.

The founding CEO was a stickler for straightlaced dealings and refused to explore the advantages of a partnership with DV Bank and Holdings, considering the rumors of my less-than-legal ventures. Looked like the man gave less of a care in his personal life. The married idiot knocked up one of his business rivals’ daughters, a small player in the underworld but one all the same, and now I had him in the palm of my hand.

Erel clapped his hands gleefully. “I love trapping idiots.”

I smirked. “It does make life more interesting.”

“Speaking of interesting,” Erel said, leaning in, and already I hated where this was headed. “How’s your little guest doing?”

“Recovering.” Two days since I last saw her in person, and I still couldn’t get the taste of her lips out of my head. I spent far too much time watching her on camera.

“You letting her loose anytime soon?”

I huffed, then swallowed the last of my drink. It went down too quickly. Cognac was too smooth for my sudden twist of mood.

“Undecided. What of the Serbs? They sign the new deal?”

Erel tapped against the armrest of his chair. This did not bode well. “Signed and sealed. They were nearly shitting themselves after our little message.”

I frowned. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“We need to talk about Thibault, man.”

“Was I told wrong? Did someone else perform the hit?” I despised liars.

“No, he did it. Quick, precise, exactly what we needed.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

Erel scratched at his hairline. “When it came to hammering the nail with our message, he froze. Couldn’t do it. I took over. The kid ended up chucking up on my boots.”

Unacceptable. If my men saw him as weak, they saw me as weak. That was not going to cut it.

Thibault was only seven years younger than me, but our souls were decades apart. After what happened to Yannick and me, our father refused to involve Thibault in the family businesses until he reached eighteen, but he died before that could happen. Now this was the result.

“He wasn’t ready.”

“Yeah, boss.” Erel heaved a sigh. “You were right.”

“Then he needs to take a more active part. No more sitting on the sidelines.”

“Like you’re doing with your guest?”

My eyes narrowed on him dangerously.

My phone vibrated once. I flipped it over on the desk to find a message from Michel.

‘She’s on the move.’

“Speak of the devil,” I muttered as I pocketed the device. I was more than a bit curious to see what she would get up to. After spying on her the last two days, I was ravenous for more.

“See yourself out.”

“Adrien, we still need to talk. There’s some chatter that could be a problem for us.”

“Later.” I crossed the room.