What I had wanted was to stop being small — and that, unlike revenge, could not be taken from me by anyone, because I was the only one who had ever been able to grant it.

Chapter 18 — My Place

A year after the ceremony, I stood in that same ballroom, under the same chandeliers, as the new executive chair of Ellsworth Technologies.

The firewall my grandfather built had done its work — it had kept the family safe by keeping me hidden — and then, when hiding stopped being protection and started being a cage, I had stepped out from behind it in the most public way imaginable, and the trust had survived it, and so had I.

There was no gold banner this time.

No throne.

No secretary clinging to anyone’s arm.

Just a room full of people who now knew exactly who I was, and a company I intended to run in the open, as myself, under a name I would no longer have to hide.

My father sat in the front row.

He did not make a speech.