Adele’s twelve percent carried audit rights, yes.

But it also carried a protection: any attempt by family members to force or coerce the transfer of her shares during hospitalization, medical incapacity, or documented familial duress would trigger the immediate, automatic suspension of the chief executive’s voting rights, pending a full review by the board.

Ingrid’s mouth fell open.

Leopold stood frozen.

Georgiana had seen this exact room coming.

She had seen it years before it happened, and she had built a trap door under it, and her son had just walked his whole weight onto it.