A Billionaire Affair

Back then he thought he had more time to make everything right.

And now?

Five years had passed and the guilt was still palpable.

“I knew your father well, Alek,” Huntsman said, reaching up with his free hand to firmly pat his shoulder. “You have already made him proud.”

Alek’s smile was slight but genuine. “He threw me in the deep end and I had no choice but to sink or swim,” he said with a chuckle.

Kwame Ansah had been determined to have his way, even in death.

Alek had to make the difficult choice of accepting the position as cochief executive officer of ADG or having all his father’s shares in the conglomerate sold, with the proceeds donated to various charities. That would leave not only Alek but the rest of his family without an inheritance. His father had to have known he would never lose the family’s legacy and financial security. Stubborn old man.

Kwame Ansah was relentless, and in the end, he had been right. Per his father’s request he had spent the last five years training inside the company in preparation to run it. He spent considerable time within every branch of the ADG learning about it from the ground floor up. He took to it all like a fish to water. He soared, driven by a desire to make his father proud, but also pure determination to thrive and win—traits he inherited from his sire.

For so long, his stubbornness to pave his own path in life had blinded him to the innate skill and tenacity his father had seen in him all the while.

Now he was prepared to take the Ansah Dalmount Group even further.

Well, along with Alessandra, he conceded, sliding one hand into the pocket of his tailored slacks and taking another sip as he shook his head.

The news that his father’s business partner had left his shares of their billion-dollar conglomerate to his daughter had yet to sit well with him. Their power in the company was equal. Each inherited 49 percent of the shares, with the board of directors left with 2 percent of the shares to decide on a stalemate between them.

Alek felt that was inevitable.

They were completely driven.

With their fathers as both business associates and close friends, Alek had known Alessandra since childhood. Ever since they were small, Alek had found Alessandra’s quiet nature off-putting. She was never friendly and seemed afraid of her own shadow. As teenagers, they were never in the same circle of friends or schools but saw each other at social functions. She was decidedly awkward and found with her head in a book more times than not. He had little patience for the mousy little introvert and was glad their time in each other’s presence became nonexistent with age.

He frowned at the memory of her during their first meeting with the board of directors of ADG. Slender and petite with a head full of massive curls that dwarfed her face. Her petite figure swamped in the shirt and pants she wore. Oversize, ill-adjusted spectacles that she continuously pushed up on her nose. Nervously biting at her bottom lip. Looking confused, lost and unaware that she was completely out of her element.

He expressed his discontent with her appointment as co-CEO, so much so that the board readily agreed to his request to do his training in their London offices while Alessandra remained in New York. That was the last time he saw Miss Alessandra Dalmount.

And all of that would change tomorrow.

Everything would change tomorrow.

Alek released a heavy breath.

“It is not your last walk to the electric chair, sir,” Huntsman said, taking the now-empty snifter from him to cross the polished floor to refill it.

Alek reached up to run his long fingers across his close-shaven head. It wasn’t the move that Huntsman spoke of and they both knew it. It was not a “what” but a “whom.”

Alessandra Dalmount.

He accepted the snifter Huntsman pressed into his hand. “What in the world was Frances thinking?” he muttered darkly, his brow furrowing as he gripped the nightcap so hard that a lesser material would have crushed in his grasp.

“Ah, the eternal question,” Huntsman said softly, his tone amused.

“I will not sit back and let her destroy everything our fathers worked so hard to build,” Alek said sharply, turning in his spot to face the older man.

Huntsman smoothed his hands over his vest before clasping his hands together behind his back and rapping his heels together. “And yet the firm still stands strong after five years of her working there,” he said smoothly, his face almost unreadable.

“But she gains forty-nine percent control tomorrow—”

“As do you, sir,” Huntsman reminded him.

“Yes, but I know what the hell I’m doing!” Alek snapped.

Ding-dong.

“Plans, sir?” Huntsman asked drily.

“Damn,” Alek swore, dropping his head so low that his chin almost touched his chest.

He’d forgotten the beautiful woman he’d met after a business lunch out on the cigar terrace of the Boisdale of Belgravia earlier that day. It had been hard not to notice one of the few women enjoying the decidedly masculine Scottish decor, particularly her handling of the long and thick cigar in her mouth as she boldly met his stare from across the terrace. She’d made an invite back to his apartment for a nightcap completely undeniable.

He’d since forgotten all about her.

Huntsman waited patiently as Alek looked down into his drink and then toward the door before looking back at his drink again. Whatever desire he had to bed the woman had waned. He couldn’t remember her name and could only vaguely recall her beauty. “Have my driver take her home and offer her my apologies,” Alek said before tipping his head back to finish his drink.

Huntsman immediately turned to do as he was bid.

Alek wasn’t proud of treating the woman like a disposable convenience. It wasn’t usually his character, but he would not be good company for her or anyone else that night. His thoughts were centered on one thing and one thing alone: how to convince Alessandra Dalmount to willingly step down from her position at ADG.

For him, that was all that mattered.

* * *

Alessandra Dalmount leaned back in her leather executive chair and crossed her legs in the pin-striped pencil skirt she wore as she coolly eyed the junior executives sitting in the leather club chairs across from her at the conference room table. The two young men glanced at each other and shifted nervously in their seats as her silence filled the air.

As she continued to study them, Alessandra took the moment to ponder how hard she had to fight to prove her worth in the last five years. She was proud to finally be so respected within the company that her silence after the presentation of a business proposal elicited subtle anxiety. In the early days of stepping into the role her father had bequeathed her, Alessandra had been nervous, fidgety and apologetic. She had felt so unsure in her role. So unworthy. So judged.

Well, no more.

“As you all know, the expansion of ADG into the shipping industry has been of the utmost importance to me for the last year,” she began. “I expect some resistance.”

From Alek Ansah.

She forced a stiff smile and nearly snapped the pen she held in half from her tightened grasp as she shifted in her seat. She forced herself to do a mental five count as her employees watched her.

Get it together, Alessandra.

“I expect my team to gather the information and analytics I need on the list of firms I am suggesting the company acquire. I will make some notations and corrections to the report and get them back to you this evening,” she said, forcing her shoulders to relax as she stood up on her sling-back Fendi heels and gave each man a hard stare. “I expect the amended reports back to me before the end of the week, sans the little loopholes I’ve already discovered after a two-minute cursory perusal.”

“But, Ms. Dalmount...” one of them said.

“That is all,” Alessandra said firmly, dismissing them as she turned to look out the window at the Empire State Building among the sprawling landscape of Midtown Manhattan.