Diane Ashford's office occupied the top floor of a glass tower across the city, minimalist and cold in a way that seemed designed to unsettle rather than welcome visitors, and Nathaniel came home from the meeting that evening with an expression I couldn't immediately read.
"She doesn't want a hostile takeover," he said, dropping into the chair across from me in our own study, still in his suit, tie loosened but not removed. "She wants a merger. A real one, board seats shared proportionally, both companies operating under a joint structure rather than one swallowing the other."
"That's not what the share buying looked like from the outside."
"No," he agreed. "The share accumulation was leverage, to make sure I took the offer seriously rather than dismissing it outright. She's smart. Ruth
