“Who the hell does he think he is?” I growled, socking the heavy bag in the upstairs office gym. “Cocky prick shows up with the nerve to ask me to reconsider that insulting offer and then just drops the dead wife bomb, like that’s supposed to make me hate him less.”

Patrick watched me from across the room, cocking an eyebrow. He’d always spent more time working out in the gym than he did actually working, but for once, I was the one who needed to blow off steam. “Did he say that?”

“No, but what the hell else am I supposed to do with that information? I’m surprised he didn’t bring his kid to bat her big, watery eyes at me.”

“If you’ve never met her, how do you know she has watery eyes?”

“I just know, okay?” I struck the bag again, this time with my knee. “She’s a Roman, which means she probably came out of the womb knowing how to manipulate people.”

“It’s been fourteen years since you even saw the guy, Ellis. I know he was a dick in high school, but people change.”

There it was again. That phrase I could go the rest of my life without hearing again. Sure, people changed. That didn’t erase the damage they’d done. A snake could shed its skin, but the venom of its bite remained just as lethal. “No one changes that much,” I muttered. “The only reason he even contacted me—no, I’m sorry, not him, his dad’s secretary—was because he wanted something.”

“He offered you a five-million dollar buyout and your current job, El,” he reminded me. “Hell, if my high school bullies offered me a deal like that, they could do more than take me to dinner.”

I rolled my eyes. “Of course you don’t get it. You’ve never had principle.” And his idea of bullying was getting stuffed into a locker freshman year, not being psychologically tortured through graduation day, among other things. “It’s different, especially for an Alpha.”

“You’re right, it is different. Me and Brayden don’t have to put the most important parts of our lives on hold for a career. You’re letting a grudge from the past cheat you out of your future.”

I spun on him, ready to make him the punching bag. The old one was getting weak at the seams, anyway. “It’s not about that,” I hissed. “It’s about preserving dad’s legacy, or have you just completely stopped pretending like you give a shit about that since the funeral?”

He frowned and I knew my words had hit their mark. “That’s not fair and you know it. Dad loved this company, but he never gave his life to it and he sure as hell didn’t want you to.”

“Whatever,” I muttered, brushing past him on my way to grab a water bottle out of the refrigerator. “I’m done having circular arguments with you and Brayden. You’re set on selling us out, and I’m set on not letting Roman Enterprises destroy everything we’ve built.”

“Don’t be like that. I know you and Bray have never seen eye to eye, but I’m not the enemy here.

“If you sign those papers next week, that’s exactly what you are.” It sounded harsh even as the words came out, but even harsher was the betrayal. Knowing the brothers who were supposed to have my back were willing to sell our company out—and me with it—to the highest bidder.

His eyes filled with hurt, along with something else. Whatever it was, I knew I had to seize it. “What?” I demanded. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“Nothing,” he muttered. I knew from the way he was refusing to meet my eyes that was a damn lie. I might have been the only omega between the three of us, but you wouldn’t have known it from the way he was acting.

“Don’t,” I gritted out. “After all the bullshit you guys have put me through these last few months, don’t add lying on top of it.”

He hesitated and glanced at the door to make sure we were alone. “Lionel called Brayden personally last night to double his last offer. The board is meeting early to take a vote.”

“What?” I cried. “How the fuck didn’t I know about this?”

“Probably because they knew you’d react like this. I’m only telling you because there’s nothing you can do about it now, and I don’t want you to get blindsided,” he said somberly. “It’s not too late to change your mind, Ellis. If you don’t flip, someone else on the board will. I’m sure Brayden and I aren’t the only ones Lionel approached.”

“No, you’re just the ones who jumped at the chance to screw me over,” I hissed. “When are they meeting?”

“Ellis —“

“Now,” I gritted out. “Tell me, or I swear to God, this is the last time you and I ever talk.”

He said nothing, but the resignation on his face was my answer. “Now?” I realized aloud. “Fuck!”

“Ellis!” he called after me.

I ignored him, rushing toward the stairs. I hadn’t planned on going before the board in my damn sweats, but I hadn’t planned on a full-scale coup, either. When I threw open the door to the boardroom, the meeting was well underway, and I could tell by the looks on all their faces that my email invitation hadn’t gotten lost in the tubes.

“Ellis,” Brayden said, standing from his chair. “What are you doing here?”

“It’s a board meeting and last I checked, I was still the CEO,” I quipped, stalking into the room and still trying to catch my breath. “Why exactly wouldn’t I be here? Unless, of course, you’re voting on something you don’t want me to know about.”

“Patrick told you,” my brother muttered. “Of course.”

“You should have told me,” I snapped, looking from him to the rest of the board members. None of them would meet my eyes. I had known most of them my whole life. These were the men and women who’d watched me grow up. Our families had traded Christmas cards and recipes, and they all knew how hard my father had worked to give them the return they deserved for their investment. “How could you do this?” I demanded. “All of you.”

“Please, Ellis, try to understand,” Lacey pleaded. She was the only omega on the board, and she’d been my mother’s closest friend for years. Her betrayal stung even more than Brayden’s. “It’s what’s best for the company.”

“For the company?” I challenged. “Because that’s not what you thought last week. What changed?” I paused and pretended like the answer had just occurred to me. “Let me guess. Lionel Roman called you last night and made you an offer you couldn’t refuse?”

She looked away in shame. A few of the other board members turned to look at her. Not that it mattered. If they were upset, it was only because they hadn’t gotten the chance.

I’d once thought that these were the people I could count on to be loyal to me, but now I knew better. My board, my godparents, my own brothers, they were only loyal until a better offer came along. Hell, at the rate this day was going, my mom was probably going to pop out of a closet and announce that she was selling her shares, too. In that moment, I realized I was alone now as I had been back then. More than a decade of clawing, scraping and doing whatever it took to gain power over my own life, and it all meant nothing. The company was all I had left, and soon, I wouldn’t even have that.

“Do you have any idea what you’re doing?” I demanded. “Forget about me, think about our employees. Think about our investors, and all the regional businesses that rely on us to keep the wolves out of the pasture.”

Brayden rolled his eyes. “We’re a business, not a charity. We won’t even be that for long if we don’t take this offer.”

“I told you, Lazr will run out of steam. They’re just keeping us on the hook, hoping we’ll give up and settle, but they don’t really have a case or they would have won it by now,” I said through gritted teeth.

“This isn’t about Lazr,” Brayden said firmly. He tossed a packet across the table and I reached for it before it could slide off.

I frowned, flipping through the first few pages. My heart dropped into my stomach when I realized it was yet another claim by a company we’d done business with back in the early days, before I’d stepped up and taken charge of quality control. My father was a hell of a salesman and a better man, but knowing how to work with vendors had never been his forte. When I’d finally severed ties with the parts manufacturer he’d worked with for the better part of a decade because he didn’t have it in him to break a contract, the CEO of Jart Manufacturing had been furious, but I was more than willing to deal with his anger.

“This is ridiculous,” I spat, dropping the claim back on the table. “Jart cost us millions in dud products, not to mention they’re the reason for half the settlements we paid after the Blue Edge line recalls.”

“Under any other circumstances, I’d agree with you,” Phil said in a solemn tone. He was the only member of the board I knew wouldn’t have caved no matter how much Lionel had offered him, if only because he didn’t need the money and he had more integrity than the rest of the board combined. If even he was against me, I didn’t stand a chance. “But as unfounded as this claim is, it’s still one we can’t afford to arbitrate. It’s the last straw, Ellis. You’ve tried your best and there’s not a person on this board who could deny that if it wasn’t for you, this company would have gone belly up a long time ago.”

As he spoke, I could feel Brayden getting more and more uncomfortable. Until the prospect of selling came up a few months ago, he wouldn’t have been caught dead at a board meeting. All of a sudden, he was interested in showing up and taking his responsibilities seriously.

“He’s right,” said Lacey. “This isn’t about your competence, it’s about moving forward in a way that’s best for all of us. The board is going to make sure that Lionel Roman knows just how valuable you are to this company, and the only things that are going to change will be for the better.”

“I guess that’s it then, isn’t it?” I muttered. “Go ahead, vote. Don’t let me stop you. It’s obvious that my opinion means nothing to you anyway.”

Lacey and Phil exchanged a worried glance and my heart sank even further. A dry laugh escaped my throat. “You already voted, didn’t you?”

“I’m sorry it had to be this way, Ellis. I truly am.”

“Of course you are.” I turned and walked out of the boardroom, and in that moment, I decided I would be fine if it was for the last time. Who needed the company or the board anyway? Maybe it was time to accept what I already knew, which was that the heart of Stover Electronics had died with my father.

I left the office and got into my car to drive nowhere in particular. I just knew I needed to get out, and a ride through the backroads was the only thing that would clear my head. The sight of the sun setting over the vineyards was one of my favorite things in the world, but my mood turned all the pastel colors gray.

The longer I drove, the worse I felt, so I decided to turn around on a small patch of dirt on the side of the road. I realized it must have rained recently too little too late and my left rear wheel sunk into what had looked like a small indentation in the earth. “Shit,” I muttered, tapping the gas in hopes that I just needed a little more oomph. The wheel spun and dug in deeper.

Because I couldn’t just have a bad day, I had to have the shittiest weekend in my recent memory. Like an omen before a storm, I should have known that Reece’s sudden reappearance in my life would only herald worse things to come. I should have known it was just the beginning.