Chapter 70 Is This Ethical?
Briar's POV
"Leo," I said, forcing my voice to soften even as fury coiled in my chest. "Hi, buddy."
"When are you coming home?" His excitement was palpable, bubbling through the phone. "My birthday party is next week! Daddy said we're having a bouncy castle and a magician and everything! You have to come!"
I closed my eyes and pressed my free hand against the wall to steady myself. "That sounds amazing, Leo. I'm sure it's going to be the best party ever."
"So you'll come?" His voice was so hopeful.
"I'll try, okay? But I'm really busy with work right now."
"Okay!" He didn't sound disappointed, just happy to have talked to me at all. "I miss you, sister!"
Before I could respond, I heard rustling on the other end, and then Marcus's voice came through, low and cautious. "Briar."
"Put him somewhere he can't hear us," I said flatly, my tone leaving no room for argument.
There was a pause, followed by the sound of footsteps and a door closing. When Marcus spoke again, the background noise had faded. "What's this about?"
"What's this about?" I repeated, my voice rising despite my best efforts to keep it level. "You authorized Pinnacle Consulting to conduct a full due diligence review of Vance Botanicals without telling me. Do you have any idea what kind of position that puts me in?"
"It's standard procedure," Marcus said. "Dominic Sterling isn't going to let Julian fund the company indefinitely. I needed to know where we stand financially before things get worse."
"Standard procedure?" I let out a harsh laugh that held no humor. "If Pinnacle digs into the books now, they're going to find every single discrepancy, every bad investment, every questionable expense you racked up before you decided to hand me the keys and walk away."
"I didn't walk away," he snapped. "I'm still the majority shareholder."
"You walked away the second you sold me to Julian Sterling to cover your gambling debts," I shot back, my voice shaking with barely restrained rage. "And now you're on a beach vacation with your new family while I'm here cleaning up the disaster you left behind."
There was a long silence, and when Marcus spoke again, his voice was tight. "I did what I had to do to keep the company afloat. You think I wanted things to turn out this way? I was set up, Briar. Someone sabotaged me."
"Someone sabotaged you," I repeated slowly, tasting the bitterness of the words. "That's your excuse? You lost everything in a business deal you were too arrogant to walk away from, and instead of taking responsibility, you blame some phantom enemy and throw your daughter under the bus to fix it."
"I made a mistake," Marcus said, and for the first time, I heard something that might have been regret in his voice. "But I'm trying to make things right now. The due diligence is just to prepare for what's coming. Dominic isn't going to let Julian keep propping us up forever, and when he pulls the plug, we need to know where we stand."
"Then you should have told me," I said, my voice dropping to something cold and final. "You should have given me the chance to prepare instead of letting me walk into this blind."
"Would it have changed anything?" Marcus asked quietly.
I didn't answer, because the truth was, it wouldn't have.
"Enjoy your vacation, Marcus," I said, my tone flat. "Just remember that the money you're spending on all of that came from selling me."
I hung up before he could respond and stood there for a long moment, staring at the phone in my hand and feeling the weight of everything pressing down on me.
I shoved my phone into my pocket and walked back toward the research wing, forcing myself to breathe evenly and push the anger down where it couldn't interfere with what I needed to do next. I couldn't afford to fall apart now, not when there was still so much at stake.
When I reached the lab, I found Owen crouched by the storage lockers, sliding something through the gap at the bottom of one of the doors. I stopped in my tracks and watched as Chloe opened the locker from the inside and pulled out a lollipop with an oddly shaped wrapper.
"What is this supposed to be?" Chloe asked, holding it up to the light and squinting at it. "It looks like a mutant strawberry."
Owen grinned and leaned against the locker. "It's a prototype. We're working on a new line of herbal candies, but we haven't finalized the packaging yet."
Chloe unwrapped it and popped it into her mouth, her eyes widening slightly. "Okay, it looks weird, but the flavor is actually really good. Berry with a hint of mint?"
"Exactly!" Owen said, looking absurdly pleased with himself. "See, I told you it was worth trying."
Chloe pulled the lollipop out of her mouth and examined the wrapper again, turning it over in her hands. "You know, if you fixed the design, this could actually be marketable. Right now it just looks like a kindergartener's art project."
Owen's grin widened, and I could practically see the gears turning in his head. "You think so? Because honestly, we've been struggling with the packaging. Our designer quit last month, and we haven't had the budget to hire someone new."
Chloe shrugged and pulled out her phone, scrolling through something before showing Owen the screen. "I do some design work on the side. Nothing professional, just for fun, but I could sketch up a few ideas if you want."
"Really?" Owen's eyes lit up like he'd just won the lottery. "That would be amazing! You'd be saving us so much time and money."
I watched the exchange with a mixture of amusement and suspicion, because Owen was many things, but subtle was not one of them. He was clearly playing Chloe, buttering her up with compliments and sob stories to get free design work out of her. And judging by the way Chloe was already pulling out a notebook and sketching rough concepts, it was working.
I pulled out my phone and sent Owen a private message.
Me: [Nice work. I'll have legal draft a contract and set aside $30,000 for design fees.]
His phone buzzed, and he glanced down at it, his expression shifting to something almost sheepish. He typed back quickly.
Owen: [She said no payment needed. She feels bad for us because we're struggling.]
I stared at the message and felt my eyebrows rise. Chloe was refusing payment? Either Owen's manipulation skills were even better than I'd thought, or Chloe was far more generous than I'd given her credit for.
Me: [Are you sure this is ethical?]
Owen: [She offered! I just mentioned we were tight on budget and she volunteered. It's not my fault she has a big heart.]
I sighed and pocketed my phone, deciding to let it go for now. If Chloe wanted to donate her time and talent to help us out, I wasn't going to stop her. We needed all the help we could get.
By late afternoon, I called an emergency meeting in the main conference room, making sure the door was locked and the blinds were drawn before I addressed the team. Eric, Owen, and three other senior staff members sat around the table, all of them looking curious and slightly wary.
"We're entering the bidding process for the Pinnacle Health contract," I said, my voice steady and authoritative. "This is the biggest opportunity we've had in years, and we can't afford to mess it up. I need a detailed proposal ready within three days."
Eric leaned forward, his expression thoughtful. "What's the product focus?"
"Moonlight Series," I said. "The immune support capsules and the herbal energy bars are our primary offerings. We'll include the Twilight Series calming tea as a secondary option to show range, but the Moonlight line is where we're putting our weight."
Owen scribbled notes on his tablet, his fingers flying over the screen. "Do we have a budget for marketing materials?"
"Minimal," I admitted. "We're working with what we have. That means every detail has to be perfect, because we won't get a second chance to make an impression."
Eric nodded slowly, his eyes narrowing as he ran through calculations in his head. "Three days is tight, but it's doable. I'll need full access to production data and cost breakdowns."
"You'll have it by tomorrow morning," I said. "And one more thing—this stays between us. No one outside this room hears about the bid until it's submitted. Understood?"