Page 8 of My Big, Fat, Hot Billionaire Enemy

“Fucking bastard,”I mutter.

I stand up and open the door. Tatiana is behind her desk. Her face remains impassive. A mask of professional discretion. She heard everything of course. She always hears everything.

“Continue the deep dive, Tatiana,” I say my voice tight. “And schedule the meeting with Ms. Hammond. My office. Tomorrow afternoon. Despite the… circus… she made an impression. Let’s see what kind of ‘strategic arrangement’ she has in mind.”

“Yes, Mr. Blackwell. And the approach for the meeting?”

I consider it. My usual tactic is overwhelming force. Lay out the bleak reality. Dictate terms. But Lucy Hammond… she didn’t react predictably at the expo. Certainly not after the robot dog incident. A part of me wonders if she planned the whole thing just to throw me off balance.

Well, either way, brute force might just make her dig her heels in deeper. To do what she did at the expo... there’s real passion there for that crumbling company of hers. Misguided perhaps, but real.

And possibly... there’s more value in harnessing that passion than extinguishing it.

It’s a thought so contrary to my father’s philosophy and my own practiced cynicism that it surprises me.

What if I don’t just dismantle it? What if I rebuild it? Integrate their legacy knowledge with my tech resources? Use her connection to the brand and her understanding of its history?

It’s a strategic calculation I tell myself. Preserve brand value. Retain key personnel. Faster integration, smoother transition, potentially higher long term ROI. Nothing to do with the unsettling flicker ofrespect I feel when I think about her stand her ground while under assault by both me and a robot. Nothing to do with the memory of her scent or the curve of her lips when she almost smiled.

Absolutely nothing.

But the idea takes root. A different path. Still leading to acquisition, still confirming my dominance, but smarter. More elegant.Myway. Not Mark Blackwell’s blunt instrument approach.

“The approach, Tatiana,” I say, finally meeting her gaze. “Will be surgical precision. I want her to understand the reality of her situation unequivocally. But I also want to assess her potential value beyond just being Richard Hammond’s daughter.”

Is there a way to win this without completely destroying her? A ridiculously sentimental thought. My father’s voice sneers in my head.Sentiment is weakness.

Maybe. Or maybe harnessing sentiment,understandingit, is just another form of power he never grasped.

“I’ll handle the meeting personally,” I add, cutting off any thought Tatiana might have had about assigning it to legal or M&A. I need to see her again. Read her myself. Gauge the depth of her resolve, her intelligence, her breaking point. Purely business of course. A necessary assessment of the opposing commander.

“Understood Mr. Blackwell. I’ll confirm the time and send the background dossier on their board members to your secure server within the hour.”

I return to my office and stand next to the window, alone with the city lights.

Lucy Hammond.

She thinks she’s coming here tomorrow to negotiate a partnership. To save her father’s legacy.

She has no idea what she’s walking into.

Or maybe she does.

Maybe that’s what makes this whole goddamn situation so unexpectedly intriguing.

3

Lucy

Okay, stay calm, Lucy.

You can do this.

It’s just a meeting.

Yeah, a meeting with a corporate shark who eats companies like Hammond & Co. for breakfast and uses their shredded logos as confetti.

My fingers fly across the keyboard in a last minute attempt to dig through every available scrap of data on Christopher Blackwell and Blackwell Innovations. Annual reports, press releases, vaguely gossipy articles in business journals. Basically anything that might give me an edge.