And they had done all of it for one reason: because Emily and Andrew were expected to marry, and Robert did not wish to damage the family his daughter was joining.

“Review every contract,” Robert said.

“If we’re legally entitled to decline renewal, demand additional guarantees, or enforce existing default provisions, then do it.

But nothing beyond the law.

Not one thing.

I will not become, even for an evening’s satisfaction, the kind of person who destroys people because he has the power to.

We will simply stop propping up a company we were only propping up out of a family courtesy that no longer exists.” It was, in its way, the most devastating decision he could have made, and also the most principled.

He would not break a single rule.