My CEO Boyfriend Kept Me Secret and Gave My Promotion Away novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: The Free Offer

Tobias's POV

Lloyd Hollister received me in his study in Lake Forest with a fire lit in August.

The air conditioning was running to keep the room cold enough for it.

"Mr. Reeve," he said, and did not get up. "Sit. Scotch?"

"No."

"Good. I don't trust a man who drinks on someone else's whiskey."

I sat.

The study had dark wood, a leather-topped desk, and a framed photograph of a younger Lloyd shaking hands with a mayor.

On the desk, squared up under a brass lamp, lay my own purchase offer.

A dozen pages, Reeve Partners at the top.

It was not Tamara's copy, and I had not sent it to anyone.

"A banker in your lawyer's building makes copies for friends," Lloyd said. "It cost me one lunch."

"What do you want?"

"A great deal less than you'd expect." He folded his hands over his stomach. "My son has made a mess. My son's mess has a plaintiff. I would like the plaintiff to stop being a majority."

"She's a majority because her father bought into your company."

"She's a majority because a boy of twenty-two saw a signature he could collect." His jaw worked. "I've spent twelve years keeping her quiet and busy. It's done now. So."

He tapped my offer with one finger.

"Merge Reeve Partners into Hollister. Combine the firms, issue the new shares to you. Her fifty-one percent becomes twenty-nine. She keeps her seat in the building, you run the company, and I keep the family name on the door."

I had to give him this.

It was a good plan, and it was legal, and he had worked out the arithmetic before I walked in.

"You'd hand me control to dilute her."

"I'd hand you everything but the name." He smiled. "You wanted the company before you wanted her, Mr. Reeve. It's in your own handwriting. I'm giving you the company."

I thought about the folder in her lap on Saturday.

I thought about her saying, if you ever want to buy anything from the Hollister family again, you'll come to me.

"Tamara has a copy of this," I said. "She's had it since Saturday. I told her myself, before you or your son could."

For the first time, Lloyd's face moved.

It wasn't much.

His eyes narrowed, and one corner of his mouth went flat.

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