The ballroom's atmosphere shifted like tectonic plates rearranging themselves as hundreds of pairs of eyes focused on the silver-haired patriarch descending the grand staircase. This wasn't just any old man—this was the last of the old guard, the final remnant of a generation that had built these empires from blood, ambition, and sheer fucking will.
Diana Beaumont straightened unconsciously, her thirty-one-year-old frame carrying itself with the kind of respect she rarely showed anyone. The old man had been her father's contemporary, one of the few people who remembered when the Beaumont name meant more than just military contracts and political manipulation.
He'd been there when her father ruled the empire she now controlled. When the rules were simpler and the stakes were just global instead of universal.
