Chapter 327
Grayson picked up a pen and tapped it against the desk. Tap. Tap. Tap. He was calculating — not the morality of it, but the PR cost. A child abuse scandal would tank the stock far more than a risky investment.
“Fine,” he said at last. He sounded exhausted. “The money is yours. The Board will approve it as a strategic diversification.”
Isolde felt a surge of adrenaline, but she kept her face completely still.
“But,” Grayson added, raising a finger. “I have terms.”
Isolde stiffened. “What terms?”
“To protect my investment, I need oversight,” he said. A small, cruel smile touched his lips. “I need someone I trust inside the operation. Someone to ensure the capital isn’t wasted.”
He paused for effect.
“Belle will join your project team as Chief Liaison Officer.”
Bile rose in Isolde’s throat, sharp and acidic.
“You want your mistress in my company?”
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“She’s my partner,” Grayson corrected smoothly. “And she needs project experience to strengthen her profile for the board. This works for everyone.” He leaned back, reclaiming the room. “Take it or leave it, Isolde. The video won’t destroy me — it will just annoy me. But without this capital, your little project dies.”
Isolde calculated.
She needed the capital for the Phoenix-X7 prototype. Without it, she couldn’t build the hardware to prove her design. And Belle? Belle was incompetent. Belle was lazy. Having her close might actually be an advantage — if played correctly. A virus was easier to neutralize when it was in a controlled environment.
Isolde straightened and smoothed her blazer.
“Fine,” she said. “She can have a desk.”
Grayson looked faintly surprised she had agreed so quickly.
“But she answers to Arland,” Isolde added sharply. “And she touches nothing technical. She is a liaison — she talks. She does not code.”
Grayson smirked. “Deal. The lawyers will draft it tomorrow.”
Isolde turned and walked out without looking back at the confetti scattered across the floor.
Her hands were shaking as she pressed the elevator button. Not from fear. From rage.
She pulled out her phone and dialed Arland. The doors slid shut around her, sealing her in.
“We got the money,” she said. “Thirty million.”
“Holy hell,” Arland’s voice crackled in her ear. “How?”
“I sold my soul,” Isolde whispered. “And we caught a virus.”
“A virus?” Arland asked.
“Belle,” Isolde said. “She starts on Monday.”
Monday morning at the Carson Dynamics research facility felt different.
The air was usually thick with the hum of servers and the quiet scratch of styluses on tablets. Today, it was loud.
Isolde stood in her glass-walled office, looking out at the open floor plan below. A delivery truck had backed up to the main entrance. Movers were unloading boxes.
Not server racks. Not testing equipment.
Furniture.
Expensive white leather ergonomic furniture that belonged in a Miami nightclub, not an engineering firm.
Isolde watched as a massive fiddle-leaf fig tree was dragged across the floor, clipping a junior engineer’s coffee off his desk.
Then Belle walked in.
.