The Merger Clause

by Adeline Cross · Ongoing · 15 chapters

Ivy Sinclair clawed her way up from temp to project manager at Halloway Media, and she is not about to watch some trust-fund golden boy dismantle everything her team built. When the acquisition papers land, they come with a clause nobody warned her about: the Cole family trust that now owns her company only releases full control if the new CEO marries within the year. Enter Damian Cole — silent, precise, and radiating the kind of contempt she thought only lawyers could manufacture. He does not want this marriage any more than she does. But refusing means the trust liquidates the company, and three hundred people lose their jobs on Ivy's watch. So she says yes, on her terms: no touching, no pretending, and absolutely no falling for him. Marriage becomes boardroom strategy, and strategy becomes proximity, and proximity has a way of finding the cracks in people who have spent years welding themselves shut. Between hostile shareholders, a grandmother with an agenda of her own, and a right-hand man convinced Ivy is a gold digger, the two of them will have to decide what they are actually protecting — the company, the trust, or each other.