Page 35 of My Big, Fat, Hot Billionaire Enemy

Lucy mentioned him. Her distrust of him. My father’s fingerprints are likely all over Weiss’s push for liquidation. He’s likely attempting to undermine my deal with her. Trying to force my hand towards the scorched earth approach he prefers. Using Weiss as a pawn. Typical Mark Blackwell bullshit.

He wants me to act like him? Fine. I’ll play the game. But I’ll play it my way.

An idea forms. Reckless. Impulsive. Strategically justifiable? Maybe. Barely.

But the driving force isn’t strategy. It’s… something else. A desire to level the playing field? A reaction against my father’s manipulations? Or possibly, a tiny flicker of wanting to see Lucy Hammond succeed, even if it’s under my terms?

Fuck it.

I leave the conference room and stride back to my desk, fingers flying across the keyboard. Accessing encrypted files. Cross referencing timelines, shell corporations, known associates of Mark Blackwell. Tatiana’s intelligence gathering is second to none. I make a mental note to increase her salary.

The connections are there. Thin, carefully obscured, but traceable if you know where to look. Weiss has been funneling information out. Receiving instructions. Paving the way for a hostile bid, likely coordinated by my father’s people, ready to swoop in if my ‘gentle’ proposal fails.

How very typical of my father.

I compile the key data points. Communication logs. Financial transfers flagged by my auditing software. Anomalies in Weiss’s trading patterns around Hammond stock options. Nothing conclusive enough for a courtroom, maybe, but more than enough to confirm Lucy’s suspicions. Enough to give her ammunition.

Why am I doing this? Helping the adversary? Giving her weapons that could potentially be used against me later? It’s illogical. It violates every rule my father taught me.

It violates most of my own rules.

Because his interference pisses me off. Because manipulating the game from the shadows is his move, not mine. Because… because maybe I want to see what she does with it. See if that integrity she preaches is real. See if she can actually fight back when given a fighting chance.

Because I...

No, I won’t go there.

I encrypt the file before I changemy mind. A simple summary. Data points. No commentary. No explicit accusations. Just the facts, laid bare.

My finger hovers over the send button. Destination:L. Hammond.Secure channel. Untraceable relay.

This is stupid. This complicates everything. She’ll know it came from me, or suspect it strongly. It shifts the dynamic. Moves me from clear adversary to… what? Conflicted antagonist? Reluctant ally?

I press send.

The file disappears into the digital ether. Gone. No recalling it.

A strange sense of… something settles over me. Not satisfaction. Not regret.

Uncertainty.

Yes, that’s it.

A profound, unsettling uncertainty.

I’ve just handed a potential weapon to the woman whose company I intend to control, the woman who inexplicably occupies my thoughts, the woman I kissed like a goddamn teenager losing his mind.

What the fuck have I just done?

The mask feels heavier now. Harder to keep in place.

Project Nightingale. Maybe the name wasn’t so random after all. Maybe somewhere deep in the cynical, calculating recesses of my brain, I actually wanted to save something for once, instead of just tearing it down. Instead of being a selfish prick.

Or maybe I’m just losing my fucking mind.

Yeah, that’s probably it.

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