The argument lasted forty-five minutes.
Not at the counter — at the dining table. The table where the partnership had been proposed, where Elena Marsh had been discovered, where Richard's notebooks had been spread. The table that held the weight of every crisis and every solution and was now holding the weight of a woman telling the man she loved that she was going to meet the man he feared most.
"No." Cole's voice was flat. Not the eleven-word voice. Not the boardroom voice. The voice of a man whose body was saying something his language couldn't — the physical, visceral refusal of a person who'd spent twelve years building walls specifically to keep Garrett Roe away from the people inside them.
"It's not your decision."
"Roe is not Mares. Mares used filings. Roe uses everything else."
"Roe called me. Not you. He wants to talk to the person who restructured the 303's architecture. That person is me."
