Chapter 7 Even
Del woke up angry, which was inconvenient, because the anger wasn't actually about anything Matteo had done.
It was about the way she'd said his first name on that terrace like she'd forgotten she had a last name for him at all.
It was about the half second she'd stood there afterward, wanting him to close the distance he'd very deliberately left open, and hating herself for wanting it in a room full of people who would eat that wanting alive if they ever caught a clean look at it.
She showered until the water ran cold, dressed in something sharp and unforgiving, and walked into Marea's office at eight in the morning with a plan already forming that had nothing to do with terraces or names or the particular low note his voice had dropped into when he'd told her not to say it again unless she meant it.
"Nico," she said, dropping her bag on the desk with more force than the bag deserved. "I need Obsidian's supplier contracts. Specifically the ones tied to their premium liquor line."
Nico looked up from his laptop, one eyebrow raised. "Good morning to you too."
"He poached my DJ. Eighteen months exclusive, locked me out permanently.
I've let that sit for two weeks while we handled the license and the inspection.
" Del pulled her own chair around to Nico's side of the desk, all business now, the terrace and everything on it filed somewhere she had no intention of visiting again this morning.
"I want to hit him somewhere that costs him the same amount of pain, and I want to do it clean enough that there's no way to trace it back to spite. "
"You're sure this is about the DJ?"
"What else would it be about?"
Nico gave her a look that suggested he had opinions he'd decided not to voice, and pulled up a supply map on his second monitor instead, the same kind of sprawling web Matteo probably kept behind his own desk three blocks north.
"Obsidian's premium liquor comes through two main channels.
One's locked into a five year exclusivity deal, ironclad, no leverage there.
The other's a smaller boutique distributor, family run, contract renews annually. That one's soft."
"How soft?"
"Soft enough that if somebody offered them a better margin and a longer commitment, they might actually consider it.
" Nico's fingers moved fast across the keyboard, pulling financials, cross-referencing margins.
"It's a bigger risk than Alvarez, though.
This distributor's reputation matters to Obsidian's whole premium brand.
If we take them, it's not just a supply gap. It's a statement."
"Good. I want it to be a statement."
They worked through the morning with the kind of focused silence that had defined every real crisis Del had weathered since opening Marea, Nico running numbers while she drafted the offer herself, word by word, precise enough that the distributor's owner would have no reason to hesitate and no reason to suspect the deal was personal rather than purely financial.
By noon the offer was sent. By two, the distributor's owner called back with questions about delivery logistics that told Del everything she needed to know about which way this was going to land.
By four, it was signed.
"He's going to know within the hour," Nico said, watching the confirmation email land in Del's inbox with the particular satisfaction of a man who'd just helped win a fight he actually cared about.
"You want to be here when he finds out, or you want to be somewhere else so it doesn't look like you're gloating? "
"I'm not going anywhere. This is my office. If he wants to have a conversation about it, he knows where to find me."
Matteo found her at six, which surprised her, because she'd expected fury delivered through a phone call or an email or, at worst, another supplier war escalating without either of them speaking a single direct word to each other.
Instead he walked into her office unannounced, the same way he had the very first time, except this time Rosa didn't even try to stop him at the door, apparently having learned by now that stopping Matteo Cristea was a losing proposition regardless of how many locks stood between him and where he wanted to be.
"You took Delacroix," he said, no greeting, closing the door behind him with a quiet click that felt more controlled than angry.
"I did."
"Family run, twenty years of loyalty to Obsidian, and you offered them a margin I couldn't match without gutting my own pricing structure on the entire premium line.
" He crossed the office slowly, and Del noticed, with something that felt almost like satisfaction, that he wasn't circling behind her desk this time.
He stopped in front of it instead, on her side of the room, ceding ground without seeming to fully register that he was doing it.
"That's not retaliation. That's surgical. "
"I learned from someone."
"I'm aware." Something moved across his face that wasn't quite a smile, sharper than that, closer to genuine respect wearing the shape of frustration.
"Eighteen months exclusive on the DJ. That was supposed to be a clean win.
Instead it cost me a twenty year supplier relationship and handed you a distributor I'll need years to replace at that margin. "
"You're not wrong."
"You're not going to pretend this wasn't personal."
"I'm not going to pretend anything. You poached my DJ specifically to lock me out permanently instead of just buying one night.
I told you at the time that felt like cruelty with a signature on it.
This is the signature on my end." Del stayed seated, deliberately, refusing to stand and meet him at eye level the way she had every previous confrontation, and watched him register the shift, the particular calm of someone who no longer needed to prove anything by matching his posture.
"You wanted to know if I'd fold. I don't fold.
I've told you that from the first conversation we ever had in this office. "
"I remember."
"So stop being surprised every time I prove it."
Something in his jaw tightened, and for a second Del braced for the escalation she'd half expected walking in, some new threat, some new pressure tactic designed to remind her exactly how much larger his empire was than her single club.
Instead he pulled the chair from across her desk, the same one Nico usually sat in during their morning briefings, and sat down across from her like this had become a negotiation between equals instead of a hostile takeover attempt.
"I'm not here to escalate," he said.
"Then why are you here?"
"Because you just cost me one of the cleanest supply relationships I've built in twenty years, in under eight hours, using nothing but precision and a distributor's own math against them, and I wanted to see the person who did that in person instead of hearing about it secondhand from Ronan.
" Matteo's voice had dropped, lower and rougher than the composed register he usually kept in business conversations, something almost like admiration threading underneath the words he was clearly choosing with more care than usual.
"That's not something I say to many people, Del. "
Her own name in his mouth landed different than Cristea ever had from her, and she hated how much she noticed it, how much the office suddenly felt smaller with him sitting across from her instead of towering behind her own desk the way he had the first time they'd met.
"You're complimenting me for beating you."
"I'm acknowledging that you're better at this than I gave you credit for a month ago.
" He leaned forward slightly, forearms braced on his knees, close enough now that she caught the same cedar and something colder scent that had filled this office the very first time he'd sat uninvited in her chair.
"That's not a small thing for me to admit.
I don't often find myself outmaneuvered. "
"Often, though. Just not often."
A real smile crossed his face this time, brief and startling, gone almost as fast as it arrived, but Del had seen it, and something in her chest tightened at having earned it, at having pulled something genuine out of a man who'd spent three weeks performing cold calculation at her like it was armor he never took off.
"Careful," he said. "You're starting to sound like you're enjoying this."
"I am enjoying this."
"The war, or the company?"
The question landed with more weight than its casual delivery suggested, and Del found herself unwilling to answer it as easily as she'd have liked, the office quiet enough now that she could hear her own pulse working faster than the conversation strictly justified.
"Both," she said finally, honest despite every instinct telling her honesty here was dangerous. "Which is probably a problem."
"Probably." Matteo didn't look away, didn't retreat into deflection the way he had on the terrace two nights ago, held her gaze instead with a directness that felt more intimate than anything either of them had said out loud yet.
"I've spent twenty years building an empire on the principle that wanting something and needing it are two different weaknesses, and you should never let anyone see either one.
I've broken that principle twice in the last three weeks, both times because of you. "
"Which times?"
"The health inspection. I showed up at four in the morning to help you fix a citation I didn't create, for reasons I still haven't fully explained to myself.
" His voice stayed low, steady, the confession costing him something visible in the set of his shoulders even as he refused to soften it into anything less direct.
"And right now. Sitting in your office instead of escalating a war you just won a round of, because some part of me would rather sit here and watch you than go back to Obsidian and plan the next move against you. "
Del's breath caught, quick and involuntary, the same betrayal her body had committed on the terrace two nights ago, and this time there was no Beatriz's toast to interrupt it, no ballroom full of witnesses to force composure back into the room.
Just the two of them, three feet apart, the office quiet except for the low hum of the AC and the distant, muffled bass of the club floor two rooms away.
"You could still escalate," she said. "Nobody's stopping you."
"I know."
"But you're not going to."
"Not tonight." Matteo stood, unhurried, and Del watched him decide, visibly, not to close the distance between them despite every signal in the room suggesting he wanted to exactly as much as she did.
"I came here to tell you, in person, that you've earned something from me I don't hand out easily.
Respect. Not because I've decided to go soft on the war, because I haven't, and I don't intend to.
But because pretending you're not a genuine equal in this fight would be a lie, and I've never once respected a lie more than I respect you. "
"That's not the kind of thing you say to a business rival."
"No," he agreed. "It isn't."
He didn't elaborate further, didn't try to soften the admission into something easier to categorize, just held her gaze another long moment before turning toward the door, and Del found herself standing without fully deciding to, some instinct refusing to let him leave this room without acknowledging what had actually just happened between them.
"Matteo."
He stopped, hand on the door frame, and turned back with an expression that told her he'd heard exactly how deliberately she'd used his first name this time, no accident, no terrace-induced slip, a choice made with full awareness of what it meant to both of them now.
"This isn't over," she said. "The war. I'm not conceding anything by admitting the rest of it."
"I never thought you would." Something in his voice had gone rougher again, quieter, and for a second Del thought he might actually close the distance this time, might finally let whatever had been building since the first day he'd sat uninvited in her chair collapse into something neither of them could take back.
Instead he held himself where he stood, disciplined despite every visible sign of wanting otherwise.
"Get some rest, Del. You've earned it today. "
He left without another word, the office door closing behind him with the same controlled click she remembered from the last time he'd walked out of a room they'd both been standing too close in, and Del sank back into her chair, hands not quite steady, staring at the space he'd occupied like it might still hold some trace of him if she looked long enough.
Nico found her there twenty minutes later, phone in hand, the specific expression of a man who'd clearly heard every word through the thin office wall and had chosen not to interrupt any of it.
"So that happened," he said.
"Don't start."
"I'm not starting anything. I'm just saying, the man who broke your license, poached your DJ, and rigged a health inspection just sat in this office and told you he respects you more than he's ever respected a lie.
" Nico leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, the same protective set to his shoulders he'd carried since the very first time Matteo had walked into this building uninvited.
"That's not a business rival talking, Del. "
"I know what it is."
"Do you?"
Del didn't answer, because she genuinely didn't know how to answer, not with any certainty that would hold up under real scrutiny, and the silence stretched long enough that Nico eventually pushed off the doorframe and left her to it, the way he always did once he'd said his piece and trusted her to sit with the rest herself.
She stayed in the office another hour after he'd gone, working through numbers she barely absorbed, one part of her mind still caught on the particular way Matteo had said her name like it meant something he hadn't fully decided how to hold.
Whatever this was, war or something more dangerous tangled up inside the war, it had stopped being simple weeks ago, and tonight, for the first time, neither of them had pretended otherwise.
That should have felt like losing ground. Instead it felt, uncomfortably, like the first honest thing that had happened between them since he'd sat down in her chair a month ago and told her Marea wasn't safe from him.
She didn't have a name yet for whatever this had become. She only knew, sitting alone in an office that still smelled faintly of cedar and something colder, that calling it a war didn't feel true anymore, and she wasn't ready to call it anything else.