The Wrath Of Adrian Morgan

Chapter 5: The Man Behind The Empire Deal

Marcus's warmth cooled the second the word "wife" left Adrian's mouth.

"So that's it?" His voice sharpened, the earlier tears gone dry. "Brenna's company sinks and you'll just stand there and watch? After everything—"

"I said I'd help my wife's company," Adrian said, unbothered. "Brenna isn't my wife anymore. She made sure of that herself, this morning, in writing."

Marcus opened his mouth, then closed it, something shifting behind his eyes as the sentence actually landed. Wife. Not ex-wife. Future tense, present tense, whatever tense a man used when he already had someone specific in mind and just hadn't said her name yet. He glanced sideways at Aurelia, who was suddenly very interested in her own gloves, and cleared his throat like a man recalculating an entire fortune in real time.

"Right," Marcus said. "Right, of course. Well." He straightened his jacket with sudden, unconvincing purpose. "I should go handle the — the Whitmore situation myself. Paperwork. Tedious things. You two go ahead into the hotel, I'll only slow you down."

He was gone before Adrian could point out that Marcus hadn't slowed down for anything in thirty years.

The convoy peeled off toward the Ramirez towers, leaving one car idling at the entrance of the Mcluxe hotel. Aurelia climbed out first, smoothing her dress, and Adrian followed with Riley's hand in his, already regretting how easily his grandfather's matchmaking had worked itself into the morning's schedule.

The lobby hit them like a wall of chandelier light and old money — marble underfoot, a waterfall feature running down one wall, the low murmur of people who'd never once worried about a bill. Adrian scanned it out of habit more than interest, and stopped.

Brenna was standing near the concierge desk in a cream suit that cost more than most people's rent, one hand pressed to her temple, clearly mid-crisis. Beside her stood a heavyset man in a suit two sizes too flattering for him, his tie pin catching the light every time he gestured, which was often.

Adrian's jaw tightened. Of all the hotels in the city.

He tried, briefly, for the dignity of pretending not to see her. It didn't work. Brenna's head turned like she'd sensed him before she'd spotted him, and her eyes landed on his face with the force of an accusation already halfway formed.

"You." She crossed the lobby fast, heels cracking against marble, voice already climbing. "Are you following me? Is that what this is? You lose the divorce leverage so now you're stalking me at my own meetings?"

"Brenna—"

"Security!" She didn't even look for them, just threw the word over her shoulder like she expected the hotel to materialize a guard on command, and two did appear, drifting closer with the particular alertness of men paid to take rich women's opinions seriously. A few guests nearby had already stopped pretending not to watch.

"I was invited here," Adrian said, keeping his voice level, refusing to match her volume. "By the Ramirez family. For a meal."

The laugh that followed came first from the man beside her — a short, ugly bark, more scoff than humor — and then rippled outward through the small crowd that had gathered, the kind of laughter that didn't need to be loud to feel like a slap.

"The Ramirez family," the man repeated, savoring it. He looked Adrian over slowly, jacket to shoes, with the specific contempt of someone doing math and liking the answer. "Sweetheart, is this the useless ex-husband you mentioned?"

Brenna's mouth curved, something ugly and satisfied moving through it. She nodded, not even bothering to dress it up. "That's him babe."

"Cole Voss." He said his own name like it should mean something, straightening his cuffs. "I happen to be very familiar with the Ramirez family. In fact—" he pulled his phone half out of his pocket, letting the gesture linger for the crowd's benefit "—I could call Marcus himself right now and clear this up in about ten seconds. Save everyone the embarrassment of humoring him."

"Please," Brenna said, arms crossing, chin lifting toward Adrian like she was already savoring the confirmation. "Go ahead. Call. Let's all watch him get thrown out like trash by actual security instead of borrowed dignity."

"It was Cole who got me the introduction to the Ramirez family," she added, loud enough to carry, turning slightly toward the small audience like she was accepting an award. "While some people were home microwaving dinner, Cole was closing deals that changed my company's entire valuation." A ripple of appreciative murmurs moved through the onlookers — a woman in pearls actually said how impressive under her breath, like she meant it.

Aurelia, standing a step behind Adrian with Riley's small hand now folded into hers, made a sound.

It started as something she was clearly trying to swallow and lost the fight almost immediately — a short, disbelieving laugh, sharp enough to cut clean through Brenna's little moment of triumph. She pressed the back of her hand to her mouth, shoulders shaking, genuinely unable to stop.

The lobby's attention swiveled toward her like a single organism.

"Something funny?" Cole asked, tie pin flashing as he turned.

"I'm sorry." Aurelia wasn't sorry at all; she wasn't even trying to sound sorry. "It's just — you really think Cole Voss opened that door?" She shook her head, wiping the corner of her eye. "My grandfather has been trying to get him—" she nodded once at Adrian, not even bothering to look at Cole "—into a room with us for months. Your Ramirez cooperation exists because of a phone call Adrian made, not because of anything your friend here did in a boardroom."

The silence that followed had a different texture than the laughter before it — thinner, more careful, the kind that made people glance sideways at each other instead of at the two people arguing.

Brenna's face had gone through several colors in the space of five seconds, and what it settled on was something closer to fury than confusion.

"Who," she said, very quietly, very precisely, each word its own small blade, "is she." Her eyes cut from Aurelia's hand still curled around Riley's, to the easy, unbothered way Adrian stood beside her, to the sudden, awful math assembling itself behind her own eyes. "Adrian." Her voice climbed, cracked at the edges. "Have you been having an affair this entire time? Is that what this was? The divorce, the — all of it, some cover story you'd already—"

"Brenna." Adrian's voice cut through hers without rising at all, and somehow that made it land harder than shouting would have. "You threw the plates. Not me."