Page 34 of Unholy Union
Tessa answers half a second later.
dancing? you mean like at a club?
is that hubby approved???
It’s approved by me.
bad girl! but yk i’m in
I knew I could count on you.
Chapter 9
Cato
Lurk - the Neighbourhood
“Let’s get down to business and discuss why we’re really here: to map out how we’ll gut Corsini Construction by the end of the quarter.”
Cassian responds first, snorting in laughter as he peers around the long, black matte table. He’s seated toward the front, directly across from me and Sergio De Rossi. Papà is at his rightful place at the head of table, as stone-faced and resolute as can be expected.
The handful of others in the room are power players within our front company, Valente Luxura.
“So much for the subtle approach,” Cassian says, reaching for his latte. “And here I thoughtIwas the impulsive one.”
“There’s nothing impulsive about it,” I answer matter-of-factly. I give a nod to my assistant, Harper, so she can begin passing out the portfolios that have been put together. “This is a carefully coordinated takeover that will be executed withutmost precision. By the time Corsini and his men realize what’s happening, it’ll be too late.”
As everyone starts flipping through the portfolios, I click the remote to the PowerPoint display. The projector hums to life, flashing the slides onto the far wall. The first slide shows photographs of the entire board at Corsini Construction.
Eight men. Three women. All Italians except two. None under the age of forty except his daughter, my now wife, Sabrina herself.
I gesture to their faces.
“Recognize anybody?” I ask the table. “The Corsinis are dumb… but they’re not dumb enough to forgo having their own on their board. Three of them are blood. The others are loyalists… or were. There’s been some recent fracturing. Some dissatisfaction with how Rinaldo runs things. It’s making some of those members nervous.”
“Not to mention the problem with their subcontractors defaulting,” snorts Cassian.
“And the shares we’ve been buying using our shell company,” adds Sergio with a devious grin and glint in his eyes.
I nod along as I click to the next slide. “That’s just the beginning. Soon Corsini Construction will be suffering a major scandal that will compromise public trust and tank them in the stock market. Meanwhile, we’ll be using their resources forourgoods.”
A few of the others seated around the table break out into sidebar conversations, but it’s not their opinions I’m looking for. My gaze lands on the rigid, expressionless man at the head of the table.
Papà pauses for a second and then slowly gives a nod of approval.
For the most part, the details I’ve presented are nothing new, but they’ve been refined and made presentable for the meeting.I click through the rest of the slides, some showing quarterly graphs of things like stocks and profits.
Cassian is on his second latte by the time we’re landing on the last slide and I’m peering around the room asking who has questions.
He wears his usual sly grin as he says, “I’ve got one. You’re about to gut her family business by day, then sleep next to her by night. How do you plan on managing that, big brother?”
A few board members chuckle. I ignore them, remaining stoic and unfazed even in the face of Cassian’s antics.
“My beautiful wife knows her place. And if she ever forgets, I’ll gladly remind her. Meeting adjourned.”
It’s as I walk out of the meeting with Harper and Lazaro only half a pace behind that my phone buzzes inside my pocket.
Harper’s already rattling off the other meeting I have for the morning—some sit-down with high-end art collectors I couldn’t give less of a fuck about—while Lazaro counters her by mentioning we’ve got “other business” to tend to.
