Page 43 of Boss Level

It wasn’t quite the same. Neither of us worked for the other.

“Would you have?” Elliot asked Scott.

Scott clenched his fists. “They don’t work for me anymore, and your situation is different.”

Just like mine.

“You can’t fire Link for this.” Elliot might be an ass sometimes, but he was loyal.

Grant scoffed. “That’s the last thing we want to do. It’s your job on the line.”

The arguments went back and forth, but in the end it came down to one thing—we all had our opinions and no amount of discussion would change how we were going to vote.

“So we’re all on the same page?” Grant asked. “As far as why we’re here?”

Unfortunately. “Let’s make this official.” I needed to say the next words, but I couldn’t.

“Do we allow Elliot Howard to stay in this position, or is it time for him to go?” Scott sounded reluctant to speak as well.

Time for him to go. I hated the sound of that. “We’re voting on two things.” I forced down my hesitation. “If we buy out his investment and if he can stay on as a head developer.”

“We can’t waver on things like this,” Grant said. “My votes are that he goes. Both places.”

“I vote that he stays. Both places.” And everyone else had better do the same.

Scott nodded. “As do I. Blanket rules with no room to consider the circumstances don’t do anyone any good. We know Elliot—Iknow Elliot—and this organization is stronger with him.”

Two to one. I knew from Xander that The Raphael Group didn’t want out of this deal, and relief hovered at the edge of my thoughts.

“Grant’s right,” Oliver said.

Elliot’s expression fell and an ache of betrayal pinged inside me. “About what?” I couldn’t let it go at that.

“About all of it. My vote is that Elliot goes. From the position. And if we don’t buy him out, be prepared to buy us out instead.”

It took all of my restraint to not stare at Oliver in dumbfounded shock. If I so much as twitched, the mask I’d frozen in place would crack. I looked at Elliot. “Take the rest of the week off, while we resolve this. I’ll tell your team you’re out. I won’t say more until we know more.” As I spoke, my fingers curled tighter and tighter into balled up fists, until my nails cut into my palms.

Elliot’s smile looked more like a grimace, and he left. Ivan went with him, under the guise of returning to his desk, but more likely to make sure he was following my request from this morning to not let Elliot wander the office.

When they were gone and the door closed behind them, I directed my anger at Oliver. “That’s not how Raphael Group votes.”

“Really?” He didn’t look unimpressed. “Last I checked, I speak for them, not you.”

When I talk to Xander—

Everything kept me from saying those words, no matter how badly I wanted to. I didn’t fall back on anyone to make my point, and even if I didn’t hate the thought, using his name this way put me in a similar position to Elliot. Favoritism. Blurred lines.

Fuck. “We’ll see. We need a tie-breaking vote and until we have that, it doesn’t matter.”

I was grateful no one wanted to sit around and chat. Normally I liked Scott’s company, but today…

At least he hadn’t left a knife in anyone’s back, though.

I got back to my office to find three text messages that came in at oddly spaced intervals.

First one was from Dominic, about ten minutes ago.How’d it go?

Next was Xander.WTF. Looking into it now.

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