Julian Barker

The final battle for my father’s legacy took place at a Walker family dinner. And I was publicly humiliated by my childhood sweetheart, my fiancé. His influencer girlfriend, Brianna, cut into my project presentation with a voice as sweet as poison. “Ava’s concept might be a little… dated.” A ripple of stifled laughter went through the guests. I stood my ground, my eyes locked on Cole, the man I had loved for ten years. I waited for him to defend me, the way he always had. But he just rose to his feet, his expression cold. “Ava, it’s time to let go of these outdated ideas.” I froze, a chill seeping into my bones. The words tore out of me. “A year ago, you handed me the flash drive for this project and said our future depended on it!” A flicker of impatience crossed his face. “I just said that to get you to wrap it up faster.” “And all those times you defended me from criticism?” “That,” he paused, a cruel smile twisting his lips, “was before I found a better face for the brand than Brianna.” In front of everyone, he placed the flash drive—the symbol of my life’s work—into Brianna’s hands. In that moment, something inside me broke for good. So I didn’t cry that night. I didn’t make a scene. I just calmly called the lawyer my father had assigned to me before he died. “Hello. I’d like to activate the Lone Star Clause in the will.” It was a long-buried strategic alliance. I would take every share of land under my name, along with the technology patents that were my father’s life’s work, and cut all ties with the Walker family. They all thought Cole had just stolen my project. They had no idea he’d just handed the sharpest knife in his arsenal to his biggest competitor. He had chosen the shiny new story that would get him clicks. And I would use the technology my father left me, at his rival’s company, to write an ending for him called bankruptcy. ... I was in Austin for an agricultural......