Page 71 of Silver Fox's Christmas Scandal
Decompressing after a string of tense client meetings used to look like me poring over numbers while downing expensive bourbons.
Now it meant bantering with her, pulling out ideas that challenged my ideas and typically ended in us naked in bed. But wasn't that a healthy thing? And they were acting like I was a sinner without knowing all the details.
But they saw what they wanted to see—favoritism, compromised judgment, a CEO losing control.
They couldn't understand that Tessa had earned every opportunity through her sheer competence, that her unconventional background gave her perspectives their Ivy League analysts would never possess.
"No one is questioning her capabilities, Lucian," Daniel said sternly. "She simply hasn't been given the authority to know the things she knows." His eyes darkened just like the others’, but I sensed he was holding back.
I glowered at him as Robert tore into me for giving Tessa access to client accounts and private financial data.
Their attack came from a place of protecting privacy, which in the legal world was massive and had far-reaching implications. But Tessa wasn't here to steal data and sell it or even to expose clients' business transactions. She was learning the ropes.
"Then I'll have her sign nondisclosures for every client, just like we would any of the analysts." I felt defensive and agitated, found myself wanting to go to bat for her and tell my own board off. But Daniel reined me in.
"Look, Cross, it's not about all of that and you know it." He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "We're all in the crosshairs if a scandal breaks out. The board is doing their job to protect Cross Capital even if you won't. We only want to protect our investments and our shareholders."
It stung that the man who'd been with me the longest now prioritized what he thought was company values over the fact that I had built this company myself.
When I went public, it never occurred to me that I may face challenges to my authority here. But here I was staring down the barrel of a scandal in the making.
"Did Viktoria put you up to this?" I asked them, but the best they could offer were more questions.
The interrogation continued for another hour. They dissected my lunch receipts, questioned my client entertainment choices, scrutinized every decision I'd made since Tessa entered my orbit. They were chipping away at my patience and winding me up like a top.
When they finally dismissed me with cold smiles, I walked back to my office feeling the walls of my empire closing in.
Viktoria was pulling strings to make me look like a fool so that my board would control me, but she had no real authority and she knew it.
The best she could do was feed lies to them and hope they took those lies as gospel, and it was working.
I stood by the window of my office looking out over the city's twinkling lights as they came on one by one. It was late. I was exhausted and angry.
I wanted to see Tessa and unload all of this frustration to feel better, but she'd gone home hours ago. Besides, running right to her after all of that would only give them more fuel for their fire. And I wanted her to be shielded from as much of this as possible.
My body ached with unspent energy after the boatload of stress hormones that'd been surging through my veins all afternoon and well into the evening. I had no outlet for this, no punching bag to smack around, no one to yell at.
I curled and uncurled my hands in my pockets but the rage continued to build anyway.
Viktoria was systematically destroying my reputation and I needed it to stop.
She thought she was protecting our children from another scandal that might cause me to lose their precious millions, and she had no idea how right she was if the board continued this witch hunt.
Blake and Elena's trust funds were secured. I could never lose them or squander them.
But I could lose my company, and I could lose my pension and everything I had in savings in a legal battle to keep Cross Capital.
What she purported to fear was the very thing she might cause to happen. I just didn't understand why.
Was it jealousy that I had moved on and forgotten about her? Was it that I had someone who was finally my equal in a way she never could’ve been?
Viktoria was all about spending my money but had never once shown interest in the business or the acumen required to do what I did here.
I wondered if she thought she was better than Tessa simply because she had more money to buy designer clothes.
Rubbing my temples, I focused on calming myself down. If I let this consume me, I'd turn into a monster with one agenda—bury Viktoria before she buried me.
And that wouldn't be healthy for my children to see at all. Tessa would tell me to think of them, and I was trying to. I really was.
