Chapter 6 - The alliance
People called it an alliance because our surnames were old.
Legally, it was several separate things.
Romano Maritime owned fifty-five percent of Hudson Crescent Terminal LLC.
Knox Harbor Holdings owned twenty-five percent.
A pension-backed infrastructure fund owned the remaining twenty.
The terminal redevelopment had a projected total capital cost of approximately $182 million over several phases.
Separate from that:
Our companies co-owned two warehouse properties.
Shared insurance programs.
Had reciprocal rights on certain development opportunities.
The engagement between Seraphine and me had no legal power over any of those agreements.
But symbolically?
Huge.
Investors liked stability.
Old family associates liked peace.
Politicians liked seeing Romano and Knox donors at one table rather than funding competing factions.
Victor and my father had spent decades competing.
Our engagement looked like a final settlement.
Seraphine believed marriage would transform symbolic influence into actual authority.
May you like
That was the beginning of another problem.
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