Page 59 of Boss On Notice
I walk into his office and he quickly says, “My brother just walked in. We’ll continue this later.”
He’s up and then we’re hugging. I feel the love emanating from me and him. We love each other, that can’t be rebutted. But respect? Now that’s a whole other ball game.
“I want to talk to you, Orion,” Herc says on the way back to his chair as if he’s the one who arranged our meeting.
“Did you view the package I sent you beforehand?” I ask.
“You mean the AI shit?” He shakes his head. “We’re not interested in AI, you know this.”
Here we go.“Are you fucking kidding me? You’ll get interested in AI when you see our product—”
“Have you spoken to Achilles?” he asks, cutting me off.
I go motionless, staring at his face. He’s not taking me seriously at all. What does he want? Does he want me to rot on the first floor, crunching unnecessary numbers?
“Herc, I want you to take me seriously. I can head up an AI division. I’ve seen the numbers—we can afford this.”
My brother runs a finger through his hair as he mocks me with a laugh. “You want me to take you seriously, Orion, when you can’t stop being a fucking liability?”
I frown, confused as hell.
“Have you spoken to Achilles?” he asks again. There’s an edge in his tone and also in the way he’s sitting there smug and judgmental.
“What do you mean by me being a fucking liability?”
His face gets pinched the way it does when he’s ready to stop imploding and explode. “We put a lot of work into carving out a deal with the Groves to get around those fucking purity clauses. And from where I sit, all you’re good for is blowing up shit. If me marrying Lauren had been our last resort, you blew that shit up. You tried to blow up Achilles and Treasure, which was part of the deal. Do you know you’re married, Orion? We can’t risk an annulment because…”
“What?” I roar.
“Of course, you don’t know.”
He goes on to tell me that the maid found a diamond ring in the bathroom’s trash can in the suite I stayed in while in Las Vegas. The ring had a serial number inside the band. Achilles had it tracked to a chapel that sold me the ring in care of Delilah O’Shay. Then, he sent me a video of my wedding ceremony and suggested I watch it privately.
“It gets kind of rated R at the end.”
It takes everything in me to keep it together.A ring in the bathroom’s trash can?Did she know? Was she the one who tossed the ring and never told me about it?
“What about my AI software?” I ask tautly.
Herc looks cold as fuck as he pulls the corners of his mouth down and says, “Not interested. But if you really want to contribute to this business for real, I can put you back in sales.”
“Is that how it’s going to be?”
Hercules shrugs. “I don’t want it to be this, Orion. Show me a different side of you for a prolonged period of time and maybe I’ll take you seriously.”
* * *
Before I enter the elevator,I watch the video Herc sent me. “Shit!”We fucked in the chapel?
I storm into the elevator and smash the first-floor button so hard my finger almost goes through it. I shake my head continuously. How will Lila answer for this? I thought I could trust her, but apparently not.
CHAPTER21
Fallout
DELILAH O’SHAY
Ihop to my feet as soon as Orion sweeps into the office. “How did it go?”
