(Ethan's POV)
The first warning came before anyone said a word.
It was in the air. The kind of silence that folds in on itself. People lowered their voices when I entered, like sound had suddenly become dangerous.
Chairs adjusted. Papers shuffled with a little too much purpose. Eyes stayed down longer than they used to.
Not respect. Calculation.
Weakness always has a sound. It isn't loud or obvious. It hides inside careful tones and sentences that start with concern. You hear it in pauses, in the way people choose not to meet your eyes.
This morning, they were all listening for it in me.
The forty-eighth floor had never tolerated hesitation. The glass walls, the steel table, the skyline stretching out beneath us—it was built for certainty. I'd made and unmade futures in this room without raising my voice.
But the air felt thinner now.
I took my usual seat at the head of the table.
My posture exact, my expression unreadable. Control was still the currency here, and I refused to spend it carelessly.
Martin Hale, older and cautious in a way that never used to bother me, cleared his throat.
"Before we start," he said, "there's been some chatter in the market."
The way he said chatter made it sound like a threat.
"About Kingston," another board member added. "And the ethics review."
I didn't blink. "Reviews are standard. We expected scrutiny."
"Yes," Martin said carefully, fingers steepled. "But timing matters. Investors are… attentive."
Attentive meant anxious. And anxious investors meant power shifting in real time.
"What are they asking?" I said.
"Continuity," Martin replied. "And focus."
The unspoken question floated in the air. Was I distracted? Was I compromised?
"Blackwood Enterprises is stable," I said, voice even. "Kingston strengthens that stability."
The silence that followed wasn't agreement. It was quiet measurement.
Then someone finally said it. "And Amelia Cross?"
Her name landed too neatly.
"She's a consultant," I said. "Her prior role gives us leverage."
"Or exposure," a different voice countered.
I let the pause stretch, deliberate. Power lives in stillness if you can stand it.
"If anyone here believes I'd allow personal history to compromise this company," I said, "then they've misunderstood how it was built."
No one challenged me. They rarely did. But the glances exchanged around the table told a different story. Calculations being redrawn.
When the meeting adjourned, the handshakes were polite, the smiles measured. The shift, though, was clear enough. Loyalty has a scent, and I could smell it thinning in the air.
By the time I reached my office, my assistant was waiting.
"Voss Capital called," she said. "They'd like to revisit their minority stake."
"Timing's interesting."
She hesitated. "Should I set a meeting?"
I shook my head. "Not yet."
When the door closed, I stayed there for a moment, leaning against the wood. The quiet pressed in, sharper than usual.
Amelia's voice surfaced in memory. Caring makes everything vulnerable.
I'd spent a lifetime proving the opposite.
And now, the proof was cracking.
I walked down the corridor toward her office. Glass walls, clean lines, no room for secrets. She looked up the instant I entered, reading the tension in me before I said a word.
"The board's restless," I told her.
She didn't flinch. "I expected that."
"You expected them to move this fast?"
"I expected them to smell blood," she said simply. "Patience is a luxury. Fear isn't."
That calm, that certainty—it grounded me more than I wanted to admit.
"They're questioning your involvement," I said.
"They should," she replied. "It complicates the story they tell themselves."
"So do you."
Her gaze softened just slightly. Not enough to invite comfort. Just enough to make the truth unavoidable. "Then stop pretending I don't."
The words hit with precision.
"The Kingston dissolution," she continued, "wasn't clean. Someone profited when they shouldn't have. If the review goes deep enough, it'll surface."
"And you?" I asked.
"I tried to stop it," she said quietly. "That's why I left."
The sentence rearranged years of history in my head. I'd built entire justifications around the idea that she'd walked away because she couldn't handle the cost of my ambition.
I hadn't imagined that she'd stayed long enough to burn for something she couldn't change.
"Why didn't you tell me?" I asked.
"Because you were already choosing the empire," she said. "And I didn't think you'd choose me too."
For once, I didn't have a defense ready.
My phone rang before I could speak.
"Blackwood," I answered.
"Ethan," Victor Voss said, smooth as ever. "Word is, your attention's divided."
I smiled without warmth. "Speculation costs money, Victor."
"So does opportunity," he said, and hung up.
I looked at Amelia. "They're circling."
"Then we move first."
The next hours blurred into strategy and controlled chaos. We built responses before leaks became stories. Revised statements. Predicted angles. Every conversation was friction—sharp, necessary, and strangely intimate.
Once, our hands brushed when we both reached for the same file. Neither of us acknowledged it, but the pulse it sent through me was real enough.
"You're still doing it," she said quietly later.
"Doing what?"
"Keeping distance when you need trust."
"Trust has a cost."
"So does isolation," she said. "You just pay later."
The words stayed long after she turned back to the screen.
By dusk, the city below us was a sprawl of headlights and moving storms. Rumors were already spreading. Small outlets. Anonymous leaks. Just enough to make investors nervous.
I found her by the window, arms folded, the skyline reflected in her eyes.
"This is getting louder," she said.
"Yes."
"And Lucas?" she asked after a pause.
"He's not involved."
"He's involved because he's mine," she said quietly. "And that makes him vulnerable."
I stepped closer. "No one will touch him."
"You can't promise that."
"I can," I said. "And I will."
Her jaw tightened. "That's not how the world works, Ethan."
"Then I'll change the rules."
For a moment, she looked at me as if she almost believed it. The air between us shifted again, weighted with everything we hadn't said.
Then my phone rang. Unknown number.
"Mr. Blackwood," a voice said. "This is the Ethics Oversight Committee. We've uncovered new material concerning Kingston's dissolution."
My grip on the phone tightened. "What kind of material?"
"A sealed affidavit," the voice said. "Signed by Amelia Cross. Dated eight years ago."
The room tilted. "And?"
"It names you directly."
The line went dead before I could speak.
I turned. Amelia was already watching me.
Her face was unreadable, but her eyes—her eyes told me she'd expected this moment.
"They found it," I said.
She nodded once. "Then the whispers won't stay whispers."
Outside, lightning flared across the skyline. The sound arrived a few seconds later, low and shuddering.
I looked past her reflection to the city below. Boardrooms. Offices. Rivals. All of them waiting.
And for the first time, I understood exactly what the silence in that morning's meeting had meant.
They weren't doubting me.
They were deciding.
And I was already standing in the crossfire.