Reagan’s POV
The conference room fell quiet the moment I walked in.
Conversations died instantly, chairs scraped against the polished floor, and more than twenty executives rose to their feet. Some did it out of respect. Others because they’d been trained to stand whenever a member of the Ashford family entered the room.
I walked past them without acknowledging anyone and took the seat at the head of the table.
"My father won’t be attending today’s meeting," I said as I opened the folder in front of me. "You’ll be reporting to me."
A few faces remained unreadable. A few looked surprised.
One or two looked disappointed.
The secretary cleared her throat. "Shall we begin, Mr. Reagan?"
I nodded.
The first hour was exactly as dull as I’d expected. Sales projections. Shipping reports. Construction updates. Every department head stood, gave a polished presentation, sat back down, and acted as though they’d just delivered the speech of a lifetime.
I barely listened.
Numbers interested me far more than people talking about them.
While the logistics director explained how well the eastern shipping division had performed, I quietly flipped through the report he’d submitted. Profit margins. Insurance claims. Fuel expenses. Shipping schedules.
Then I stopped.
"...Continue."
The man smiled, mistaking my silence for distraction.
"As I was saying, the eastern division exceeded our quarterly projections by almost twenty-three percent."
"It didn’t."
His smile froze.
"...Excuse me?"
I looked up from the report.
"The eastern division didn’t exceed anything."
I tapped the page with one finger.
"It lost money."
The room went still.
The logistics director let out a nervous chuckle. "I’m afraid you’ve misunderstood the figures."
"I don’t think I have."
I turned the report around and slid it across the table.
"Explain them."
He adjusted his glasses and skimmed the page before looking back at me. "Everything there has been verified."
"No. Everything there has been rewritten."
His confidence slipped, just for a second.
"You’ve listed six cargo vessels making eight overseas deliveries in eleven days."
"...That’s correct."
"No, it isn’t. The travel time alone makes that impossible."
Nobody spoke.
I leaned back in my chair and folded my arms.
"So either your ships have learned how to teleport..."
"...or somebody changed the numbers."
Silence settled over the room.
The logistics director opened his mouth, closed it again, then looked toward the other executives as if expecting someone to rescue him.
Someone did.
A low laugh came from halfway down the table.
I already knew who it belonged to.
Mr. Wallace.
Old enough to be my grandfather. Built like he’d never missed a steak dinner in his life. His expensive cigar rested comfortably between thick fingers, and the gold rings on his hand probably cost more than most people earned in a year.
He’d built half the city’s real estate empire.
He’d also been with my father longer than almost anyone in this room.
"Sharp eyes," he said, taking another slow puff of his cigar. "I’ll give you that."
A couple of executives laughed politely.
Wallace looked at me over the smoke.
"But you’re here to represent your father, son."
His smile widened.
"Nothing more."
I didn’t respond.
He continued anyway.
"It happens every generation. The heir wants to prove himself."
Another puff.
"I admire the enthusiasm."
He gestured lazily toward the reports.
"But perhaps we should wait until Devon gets here before we start accusing people of fraud."
A few heads nodded.
Finally, another executive found the courage to speak.
"With all due respect, Mr. Reagan... reports can be misread."
"Exactly," Wallace agreed. "No shame in that."
He smiled at me as though he were explaining something to a child.
"Leave the important decisions to your father."
I glanced around the table.
Interesting.
Not one person had tried to prove the figures were real.
They’d spent the last five minutes defending the people behind them instead.
That told me everything I needed to know.
I closed the report.
"If I’m wrong..."
I pushed it back across the table.
"...open the original books."
Nobody moved.
Not the logistics director.
Not accounting.
Not legal.
Nobody.
Wallace’s smile faded just a little.
"I like confidence."
He rested the cigar in the ashtray.
"But confidence isn’t experience."
His eyes never left mine.
"One day this company will probably be yours."
He shrugged.
"But today..."
"...you’re still just the boss’s boy."
A few executives lowered their eyes.
Others suddenly became very interested in their laptops.
I held his gaze.
"When my father arrives..."
My voice remained perfectly calm.
"...I’ll ask him if he’d like to see the real books."
The room lost what little color it still had.
Nobody laughed this time.
Wallace studied me for several seconds before speaking again.
"Careful."
"I always am."
"You don’t know who you’re accusing."
"I know exactly who I’m accusing."
I opened the report again.
"The eastern division somehow increased profits while insurance payouts doubled."
I turned another page.
"Fuel costs dropped despite longer routes."
Another.
"And maintenance expenses disappeared completely."
I shut the folder.
"So either someone has invented ships that repair themselves..."
"...or someone in this room thinks my father doesn’t read his own financial reports."
The logistics director swallowed hard.
Wallace leaned back again, though the confidence he’d worn a minute ago wasn’t quite as convincing anymore.
"You’ve got spirit."
"I’ve been told."
"But spirit doesn’t run companies."
"No."
I stood.
"It exposes the people stealing from them."
The room froze.
The logistics director cleared his throat.
"Mr. Reagan... I think we’ve gone far enough."
"I don’t."
He glanced nervously toward the doors.
"This is something Mr. Devon should decide."
There it was.
The real issue.
Not the reports.
Not the missing money.
Me.
To them I wasn’t the man leading the meeting.
I was simply Devon’s son filling a chair until the real boss arrived.
I looked around the room before giving a small nod.
"Fine."
The relief on several faces was immediate.
"We’ll wait for him."
Nobody spoke after that.
The room settled into an uncomfortable silence broken only by the ticking of the clock and the faint hum of the air conditioner.
Then...
The conference room doors opened.
Every executive’s back straightened before they even realized they’d moved.
Father stepped inside, his eyes sweeping slowly across the room—the untouched reports, the tense expressions, Wallace’s abandoned cigar—before finally stopping on me.
One corner of his mouth twitched ever so slightly.
"...Looks like I’ve interrupted something."
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