The Ex-Wife's Burning Elegance

Stella recounted the call she'd just received from the shareholders to Joshua, laying out every detail. By the time she finished, she could practically piece the entire scheme together.

"I'm almost certain this is my brothers' doing," she sighed.

As for Skyler, she doubted he'd ever get his hands dirty or leave any evidence behind, but he certainly wouldn't lift a finger to stop them, either.

Stella's gaze drifted to the stack of acquisition documents on the table. "Haynes really does have vision," she mused.

Joshua leaned in with a suggestion. "Maybe we should reach out to that Jake guy first. If he's for real, not only will we have nothing to worry about financially, but we'll even have leftover funds to invest elsewhere."

"My thoughts exactly," Stella replied. "Jake was my first choice, too. Still, we need a backup plan. If he turns out to be a fraud, we can't afford to be caught completely unprepared."

Right now, selling off their original shares had hit a snag.

Their options were clear: Jake, or scraping together loans from various sources.

She trusted Haynes, Foreman, and the others implicitly. They would never cheat her; if it came to it, relying on them as a last resort made the most sense.

But she'd owe them-big time.

With the contract signing looming, this wasn't the moment to dwell on favors owed.

After a moment's thought, Stella decided to contact Jake herself.

away. As soon as

was private-a discreet club outside the city center-

arrived half an hour early, but when she opened

was alone-no assistant,

greeted her with a warm smile

pleasantries, he slid

wasn't ready to trust Aicken just yet, so she hadn't told him about the meeting

his part, didn't believe anything would come of it. In his mind, Jake was

change. With that much on the line, nobody would just hand

had reviewed the

it to him for a second

read it over carefully, then nodded.

final page, Stella signed

signature—just a single

really be legally binding? The thought

her phone

out and blinked

string of zeros after the

before finally accepting that the full five billion had

Upfront. The entire amount.