The message from Vantage Holdings' legal counsel arrived on a Thursday morning and landed in Rowan's inbox with the particular quiet of something that had been composed very carefully.
He read it at his desk. Read it again. Then he forwarded it to Patricia Chen with three words: Call me immediately.
Patricia called in four minutes.
"I've read it," she said. Her voice had the controlled flatness of a lawyer who was managing her reaction. "It's creative."
"It's a legal challenge to the marriage clause," Rowan said. "On the grounds that the marriage was entered into under fraudulent pretenses."
"Specifically that Elara entered the marriage using it as cover for an investigation into Vale Industries, which, they argue, constitutes fraudulent intent sufficient to void the contractual basis
