Chapter 221

• Watching Aunt Hazel’s complexion lurch from pale to crimson and then drain back to stark white, I allowed myself a rare flicker of satisfaction.
• Finally Aunt Hazel the supposedly untouchable matriarch of the Hamilton corporate dynasty was tasting her own medicine. For years she’d operated without consequence, her authority uncontested. But not today. Not in this boardroom. Not when the adversary she’d underestimated happened to be Cassandra.
• I wasn’t entirely sure why Aunt Hazel hadn’t tried to leverage the incident into a full-blown accusation. In corporate terms, publicly disrespecting a senior board member especially one tied to the family trust was no small issue. On paper, it was grounds for disciplinary action, even suspension. Yet watching her retreat into silence, face contorted with the realization that she had no clean move left, made it crystal-clear: Cassandra wasn’t going to be punished.