Ruined (Ethan Frost 1)

aged to build an empire that actually makes the world a better place. To find out that under the surface he’s just like everyone else—taking what he wants and to hell with the consequences—blindsides me in a way I am completely unprepared for.

Our meeting finally breaks up around ten-thirty, but that’s only because the lawyers have been called in to a bigger meeting. One that involves the head of R&D, the CTO, and, of course, Ethan Frost himself. It also involves the same people from Trifecta. Sick to my stomach and my soul, I gather up my things and prepare to head back to my desk. I’m lost in my own little world, thinking about my future career and how walking away from this internship will affect my chances of getting into a good law school, when one of the lawyers calls my name.

Dazed, I turn to Carlos, wondering what other morally corrupt task he’s going to assign me. But he just smiles and says, “Where are you going? You’re coming to the meeting with us. ”

“I am?” I sound as shocked as I feel. Admittedly, I’m not up on how big corporations handle these things, but I’m pretty sure little interns like myself aren’t invited to the big shows.

“Absolutely,” Marni chimes in. She’s one of the other lawyers, and the woman I’ve been reporting to since I was assigned to the merger. “We’re big believers in rewarding good work around here, and yours has been stellar this week. Now you’ll get a chance to see how all your research will help close the deal. ”

They’re both watching me like they expect me to start screaming in excitement at any moment, but all I can think is that what they’re offering is absolutely the last thing I want to be a part of. Bad enough to know I’ve contributed to the death knell of a family business, but to see it all happen in person…I’m not sure my stomach, or the rest of me, is strong enough for that.

But invitations like this one don’t grow on trees, and refusing it would be an extremely stupid thing to do. Part of me doesn’t care, but the other part—the one that cares too much about getting into law school—won’t let me do anything but nod and say, “Thank you. ”

Trifecta is a San Diego company, only about a half hour’s drive away from the Frost Industries headquarters. I ride over with Carlos, Marni, and Jace, one of the other interns who is also being rewarded for his “stellar” work. We arrive before Ethan and the other bigwigs so we hang in the lobby waiting for them.

Though I’m facing away from the door, talking to Jace, I know the second Ethan walks into the lobby. The oxygen seems to be sucked out of the room even as an electric charge fills the air. One laced with excitement and determination and an underlying rage that seems completely out of place.

But when I turn to look at Ethan, I see all those emotions—and more—in his eyes. At least until he banishes them behind a poker face that would do Lady Gaga or a Vegas cardsharp proud. He scans the assembled crowd of lawyers, interns, and R&D people without expression. At least until he comes to me. Then his eyes widen slightly and he nods in acknowledgment, though he doesn’t address me directly.

Something I’m grateful for, considering the mixed-up state of my emotions. A confusion that only gets worse when Ethan quietly tells the lawyers, “Make no mistakes. We’re not leaving here without an iron-clad agreement. This is it. ”

They nod accordingly, and any hope I had that this was a bad dream or a misunderstanding, something—anything—to prove this isn’t as awful as I think it is, vanishes. With it goes any interest I have in seeing Ethan for our date tonight, or ever. He may make me feel things no other man has, but my body isn’t in control. I don’t date men who care more about their power and their bank accounts than they do the people whose lives they ruin.

This meeting goes pretty much as expected—which is to say that it goes terribly. Jace and I are relegated to a corner of the table where we don’t talk, don’t move, barely breathe. All we do is listen and watch as the pincers of Frost Industries close slowly, relentlessly, around Trifecta.

“We’re giving you everything else,” the CEO says in a last burst of desperation. “And at a very fair price. It’s absurd that you’re holding out for these last three patents. They have nothing to do with your current agenda or products. I just don’t understand. ”

The moment the words leave his mouth, I know they’re a mistake. I can see it in Ethan’s eyes, in the set of his shoulders and his mouth. The man has just pushed him over an edge that none of us had any idea he was close to. Even before he starts to talk, I know that the fallout isn’t going to be good.

Calmly—too calmly, in my opinion—Ethan leans forward. He looks the man directly in the eyes and in a voice so low it shouldn’t carry but somehow does, he says, “You don’t need to understand. All you need to know is that I own fifty-eight percent of this company, and hold nearly two-thirds of the voting shares. Trifecta, in its entirety, will be absorbed by Frost Industries and it will be absorbed now. Not in six months, not in a year.

“I have been patient while the lawyers on both sides worked up an agreement that is more than equitable for you. I’m done being patient. Either you and your board of directors sign the agreement—as is—or the next one you get will be a lot less beneficial to any of you. And you will sign that one.

“Either way, I’m done arguing about it. This merger will happen. I will get the patents that your family holds. And you will be out. The only thing left to decide is if you walk away with enough money to make you, your children, and your grandchildren comfortable for the rest of your lives or if you walk away with nothing. The choice is yours. ”

Ethan stands up then, his words still ringing in the shocked and silent room. Then he walks out, his CTO and the other executives right behind him. Which means the only people left in the room from Frost Industries are the lawyers—all of whom suddenly look extremely formidable.

After a moment, Carlos clears his throat. He looks their head counsel in the eyes and says, “You heard the man. It’s time to make this happen. ”

The next ninety minutes are some of the most uncomfortable of my life. Blood is in the water, and everyone knows it. Any objections by Trifecta’s team are dealt with quickly and ruthlessly, and in the end we walk away with a preliminary agreement in place. One that gives the Trifecta group quite a bit of money but which in return takes every single thing they have. Exactly as Ethan said it would.

My blood is boiling when I climb into the backseat of Marni’s car. The two lawyers and Jace are ebullient, nearly high with the thrill of their victory. All I can see, however, are the faces of the Trifecta CEO and his son, both of whom have spent their whole lives working to make the company what it is today, only to have it snatched away from them right before they took it to the next level.

But, really, it’s not their faces I see. It’s my brother’s. My brilliant, trusting brother, whose mind has conceived of some of the greatest breakthroughs in communications technology in decades. My brother, who has had two of his ideas stolen right out from under him by corporations just like Frost Industries. Whose subsequent ideas have all gone to my father and the company he opened with the blood money he received from Brandon’s family in exchange for selling me down the river.

My brother doesn’t understand my outrage. To him, it’s all about the glory of the idea. Seeing what he invented out in the world, doing what it was invented for. As long as he makes enough money to live comfortably and still fund his research, he’s happy. And if everyone but him gets rich off what he invents, it doesn’t bother him. Hell, he doesn’t even seem to notice. My dad tells him the money is all in the family, that there’s enough for everybody, but I know the truth. The second Miles stops conceiving of new and exciting things, the second he stops inventing things that will move my family’s bright and shiny new company forward, he’ll be out. Just like me. My father might draw the line at eating his own young, but he has absolutely no problem with sacrificing us.

The rage is building inside me, making it hard to breathe, to think, to function. So I slam a door closed on my emotions, stop thinking about my family and Frost Industries and what just happened in that conference room. Instead, I pull out my phone. Open up my email. And send a short, not-so-sweet message to Ethan’s work account.

I can’t make it tonight. Please don’t call me again.

We get back to work around one-fifteen. Since we worked through lunch, Marni suggests we all head down to the cafeteria, but I beg off, saying I’ve got a lot of work to do. Which is the truth. Though the preliminary agreement is in place, there are still a lot of questions in my files that I need to answer, a lot of case law that I need to weed through. And since the last thing I want to do is spend another hour listening to them congratulate themselves for pulling the rug out from under the Trifecta CEO, I might as well get started.

Back at my desk, I open up my email, nearly afraid of what I’m going to find. Sure enough, there’s a reply from Ethan, one that came only a few minutes after I sent the original email.

My hand is shaking when I open it, but I force myself to do it. I’ve made the right decision, for both of us, and I need to see it through. We’re too different to ever have made a go of it.

Ethan’s email is as terse as mine was. Just two sentences: