RYAN POV
Ryan sat in the conference room and watched his empire fall apart in real time.
Sarah stood at the front of the room presenting data like she was reading from a script she'd written a thousand times. Company A was overvalued. Company B had hidden debt. Company C was under investigation. His expansion plan was going to bankrupt the company.
Every word she said was backed up by information. Every argument was unassailable. Every number made his strategy look like it had been created by someone who didn't understand business at all.
And the worst part was that she was right.
He'd spent months planning the acquisition strategy. He'd shown it to investors. He'd briefed the board. He'd felt confident. Brilliant even. Like he was seeing something that no one else could see.
But Sarah had just shown the entire room that what he was seeing was actually a disaster waiting to happen.
"Your vision would have destroyed the company," Sarah said. Her voice stayed calm. Clinical. Like she wasn't dismantling the most important thing he'd built. "Not tomorrow. Not next year. But within two years, you would have lost billions in shareholder value."
Ryan tried to push back. He tried to explain his reasoning. He tried to defend the companies he wanted to acquire. But every time he opened his mouth, Sarah just presented more data. More analysis. More proof that he was wrong.
It was humiliating.
It was infuriating.
And it was absolutely correct.
The board voted unanimously against him. Not a single director stood up for his strategy. Even Derek, his oldest friend, didn't vote in his favor. Derek just sat there looking uncomfortable while the rest of the board embraced Sarah's alternative plan.
Ryan walked out of the conference room before the vote was even finished.
He made it to his office and locked the door behind him. He stood there for a moment just breathing. Just existing. Just trying to understand how everything had changed so fast.
Two days ago, he was a genius. A visionary. A self-made man who'd built an empire from nothing. Today, he was someone whose own co-owner had just publicly destroyed his strategy in front of his board.
His hands were shaking when he called Amber.
She didn't answer.
He called again. Still no answer. He texted her. Called her a third time. Nothing. He scrolled through his phone trying to find someone else to call. Someone who would tell him that Sarah was wrong. That his strategy was sound. That he was still brilliant.
There was no one.
He scrolled through his contacts and realized something that made his stomach drop. He didn't have any real friends. He had business associates. He had people he'd met at parties. He had Derek, who'd just voted against him. But he didn't have anyone who actually knew him. Anyone who actually cared about him. Anyone who would tell him the truth instead of just telling him what he wanted to hear.
The only person who'd ever known him like that was Sarah.
And he'd destroyed that relationship because he was too selfish to appreciate what he had.
Ryan sat at his desk and stared out at the city below. This view had always made him feel powerful. Like he owned everything he could see. But right now, it just made him feel alone.
He opened his laptop and pulled up the contract files Sarah had been studying. He started reading through them himself. Really reading them. Not skimming like he usually did. Actually reading and understanding what he'd approved and what he'd ignored.
Sarah was right about everything.
The product development timeline was way behind. The marketing budget was completely out of control. The subsidiary investment was a disaster. Every single thing she'd identified was a legitimate problem that he'd missed because he was too busy celebrating his success to actually manage his company.
His vision wasn't brilliant. It was reckless.
His strategy wasn't innovative. It was dangerous.
And the woman he'd cheated on and discarded had just saved his company from himself.
Ryan's phone rang and he almost didn't answer it. But the caller ID said Mom and he knew he couldn't ignore her. Victoria Wolfe didn't take ignoring calls well.
"I saw the news," his mother said before he could even say hello. "I saw the boardroom disaster. I saw you get publicly humiliated by your ex-wife."
"Mom—"
"I'm calling you from the airport," she continued. "I'm on a flight to Seattle. I land in four hours. We need to talk about how we're going to handle this."
"Handle what?" Ryan asked.
"Removing Sarah Mitchell from your company," Victoria said. Her voice was sharp. Determined. Everything about her tone said she was ready for war. "You built that empire. You earned it. You're not going to let some woman take what's yours."
"She didn't take anything. The court gave it to her. The clause was in the divorce agreement. I signed it without reading it."
"Then we find a way to unread it," Victoria said. "We find a loophole. We find something in that agreement that lets us prove it was fraudulent or obtained under false pretenses or something. I have lawyers who can find it."
"There is no loophole, Mom. The court already ruled. Sarah owns half the company legally."
"Then you buy her out," Victoria said. "You offer her money. You offer her whatever she wants. But you don't let her sit on your board. You don't let her make decisions about your company. You don't let her think she can win against a Wolfe."
Ryan felt something twist in his chest.
"I don't have the money to buy her out," he said quietly. "Fifty percent of the company is worth billions. I can't raise that kind of capital without selling off major assets."
"Then sell them," Victoria said. "Sell whatever you need to sell. But get her out."
"If I do that, the company will collapse. Sarah's strategy is better than mine. We need her."
The line went silent for a long moment.
"Did you just say you need her?" Victoria asked. Her voice was ice cold now. "Did you just tell me that you need your ex-wife to run your company?"
"I need the partnership model. And she's the one who developed it."
"Find someone else to develop it," Victoria said. "I didn't raise you to surrender to women. I didn't teach you to accept defeat. I taught you to take what you want and never let anyone take it away from you."
Ryan felt the weight of her words settling on his shoulders. He'd spent his entire life listening to his mother. Believing in her philosophy. Making himself into the kind of man who could build empires but couldn't build relationships.
And it had left him alone.
"I'll be at your office in four and a half hours," Victoria said. "We're going to figure out how to remove her. I promise you that."
She hung up before he could respond.
Ryan sat at his desk in the silence of his empty office and realized something. His mother had called him saying she was going to fix this. That she was going to destroy Sarah. That they were going to war.
And Ryan was supposed to feel relief. He was supposed to feel supported. He was supposed to feel like his mother was in his corner fighting for him.
Instead, he felt sick.
Because somewhere deep inside him, underneath all the arrogance and ambition and need for power, he knew that his mother was wrong. He knew that Sarah wasn't the enemy. He knew that the enemy was the man he'd become because of everything his mother had taught him.
A man who built empires but couldn't build relationships.
A man who took what he wanted without thinking about who it hurt.
A man who'd destroyed the only person who'd ever actually seen him and believed in him anyway.
And now his mother was coming to Seattle to make sure he stayed that way.
Ryan looked at his phone and realized he had four hours to figure out what he actually wanted.
Did he want to listen to his mother and remove Sarah? Did he want to become the kind of man who fought against the only person trying to save his company? Did he want to spend his life exactly like his mother had spent hers, alone and convinced that being powerful was the same as being happy?
Or did he want to try something different?
The answer scared him more than anything Sarah had said in that boardroom.
Because the answer meant admitting that he'd been wrong about everything. That his mother had been wrong. That the man he'd spent his entire life becoming was actually the problem.
His phone buzzed with a text from his mother.
Plane is boarding. See you soon. We'll fix this together.
Ryan stared at those words for a long time.
He had four hours before his mother arrived ready for war. Four hours before she started pushing him to remove Sarah from the company. Four hours before everything got worse.
And he had absolutely no idea what he was going to do.