The storm outside the hospital window didn't break for three hours. Long after Warren Cole pulled a metal chair beside my bed, long after the first twin—a fierce, red-faced little girl who wailed with the breath of a fighter—was placed against my chest, the rain hammered the glass like an eviction notice.

When the double doors swung open, the three men sitting at the far end of the long mahogany table didn't look up immediately, assuming it was just another jittery vice president bringing quarterly loss reports.

Then Warren Cole walked in.

And behind him, wearing a bespoke midnight-blue pantsuit that cost more than my first delivery van, walked me.

Derek Fontaine stood up so fast his leather executive chair rolled backward and crashed into the walnut credenza behind him. His sandy hair was slightly disheveled, dark circles bruised beneath his eyes—the universal look of a man who had spent three days dealing with probate lawyers and emergency board meetings.

"Amelia?" Derek stared at me, his mouth parting slightly before his eyes shifted to the man standing beside me. "Warren Cole? What the hell is this? What is she doing here?"

"She’s here because she’s my guest, Derek," Warren said smoothly, taking a seat at the head of the table without waiting for an invitation. He motioned for me to take the chair to his right.

I sat down, keeping my back straight, my hands folded neatly over the leather folder in front of me. The months of catering for high-society banquets, of standing in hot kitchens while arrogant men yelled about undercooked steaks—it all hardened into something unbreakable inside me. I wasn't the scared girl in the hospital gown anymore.

"This is a private corporate board meeting," an older man with silver hair and a deeply tanned face snapped. He was Arthur Fontaine Jr., Derek’s uncle and the newly appointed CEO of the conglomerate. "Get out of here before I have security throw you both out."

Warren didn't blink. He reached into his leather briefcase, pulled out a single stapled document, and slid it across the polished mahogany table until it stopped right in front of Arthur’s coffee cup.

Arthur glanced down. As his eyes scanned the first paragraph, the deep tan on his face seemed to fade into a sickly gray.

"What is this?" Arthur whispered, his hands beginning to shake.

"That," Warren said softly, his voice cutting through the silent room like a scalpel, "is a notice of immediate default on the twenty-five-million-dollar bridge loan Cole Capital extended to your soybean processing facility in Valdosta last quarter. Due to a clause regarding executive instability and potential bankruptcy risks following the sudden death of your primary guarantor—your brother—we are calling the loan in full. Payable within forty-eight hours."

Derek slammed his hands down on the table, leaning forward so hard his face flushed red. "You can't do that! That loan isn't due for another eighteen months! There are covenants—"

"The covenants include a clause regarding reputational risk," Warren interrupted, his pale eyes locking onto Derek with lethal precision. "And nothing screams 'reputational risk' quite like a multi-million-dollar agricultural conglomerate being sued in family court for trying to bully a mother of newborns while their own financial house is burning down."

Derek turned his blazing stare from Warren to me. His expression twisted from shock into something ugly and venomous.

"You brought this psychopath into our lives?" Derek snarled, pointing a shaking finger at me. "You think some billionaire playing white knight is going to save you from my family? We will crush you, Amelia! We’ll take the kids, we’ll take your little catering business, and we’ll make sure you never work in this state again!"

I didn't flinch. I didn't look down.