Chapter 2

Filing the police report didn't smother anything. It fed the wildfire.

On Blind—the anonymous forum where corporate America went to talk shit without consequences—the thread about me had metastasized into something monstrous.

[Senior leadership confirms: a certain rising star paved her way to the top in Landon's hotel bed.]

[Someone trace her external IP. Word is she's been funneling core deal data to a competitor for months.]

The comments were vile enough, but someone had gone further—fabricating screenshots of backdoor server access logs with my credentials stamped across them.

This wasn't character assassination anymore. This was a frame job designed to put me in prison.

I stared at the screen, drew a slow breath, and called the care facility.

"Hi, this is Sloane. If anyone reaches out claiming to be a journalist or a colleague of mine, asking about my mother—block them. All of them. She has a heart condition. No stress. None."

In my previous life, these people had dragged the filth straight to my mother's doorstep. The shock sent her into cardiac arrest and onto a gurney.

Not this time. I wasn't leaving them a single opening.

I'd barely hung up when the desk phone rang.

"Sloane. My office. Now." Brenda Grimshaw—clipped, corporate-cold. HR at its most weaponized.

"On my way."

There it is.

I opened the recording app, watched the green Live Cloud Sync indicator blink on, and slid the phone into my blazer's interior pocket.

No hesitation. I strode down the corridor, skipped the knock, and pushed the door open.

What waited inside was nothing like a formal inquiry.

Landon Ashby—the very man starring as my alleged lover in this morning's hit piece—was perched on the edge of Brenda's desk.

They stood too close for it to be casual—radiating the smug entitlement that came with partner-level immunity.

My entrance caught them off guard.

Brenda stepped back, cleared her throat, and reassembled her composure. "You knock before entering, Sloane. Sit down."

I didn't speak. Didn't sit. Just looked at them.

Brenda's brow creased. She slid a thick document to the edge of her desk and fired first.

"You blasted a cease-and-desist into a company Slack channel. You're dragging this to the police. The partners are extremely displeased with this—" she searched for the word, "—emotionally volatile approach to what should be handled internally."

"Internally?" My face stayed blank. "Fabricated evidence. Defamation. False allegations that I sold deal data to a competitor. And you're calling this an internal matter?"

"Relax. No need to get so prickly."

Landon chuckled, cutting through the standoff.

He rose from the desk and drifted toward me, close enough that I could smell his cologne. His gaze dropped to my collar without a shred of subtlety.

"Drop the right-and-wrong routine. This isn't business school. In this building, truth is worthless. Only leverage counts."

His voice turned slick. "A beautiful woman fighting alone is a dangerous thing. The firm doesn't want to destroy you—but it won't tolerate a scandal metastasizing either."

Right on cue, Brenda tapped the document, tone dripping with rehearsed concern.

"Voluntary withdrawal from your promotion candidacy, paired with a standard NDA. Sign it, take paid leave."

She paused, wearing the face of someone doing me a favor. "Sloane—in this world, perception is reality. The accusation alone is a stain that doesn't wash out. The firm needs you to think bigger picture."

"And if you take this one step back—" Landon planted a hand on the wall behind me, boxing me in, "—I'll move you onto my core deal team."

"My personal attention, my resources. Life gets a whole lot easier." A slow, proprietary smile. "Smart women know when to say yes."

In my last life, this was the room where I'd broken.

Their seamless routine had reduced me to tears and desperate pleas—check the security cameras, please, just check—only to end with a termination letter cold as a coroner's report.

This time, I didn't spare the document a glance.

I lifted my chin, looked straight into Landon's calculating eyes, and let a frigid smile settle on my lips.

My voice stayed level. Almost conversational.

"Landon. Brenda. Every single word you just said—I recorded it."

The silence that followed was vacuum-sealed.

Brenda's face drained of color. She shot to her feet, jabbing a finger at me.

"Are you insane? Unauthorized recording is a terminable offense! Hand over that phone—now!"

Landon dropped the mask. His expression went flat and dangerous as he closed the distance in two steps, reaching for my blazer.

I stepped back smoothly and his hand caught nothing but air.

"Don't bother. From the moment I walked through that door, the recording's been streaming to my attorney's encrypted cloud server in real time."

I watched his hand hang frozen in midair.

"Landon—you just offered me your personal attention in exchange for my silence. Save that explanation for the jury."

I turned, gripped the door handle, and cast one final look over my shoulder.

Their faces were caught somewhere between fury and the dawning edge of fear.

"I'm not signing. I'm not taking leave. And I am not withdrawing. You want to fire me? Do it today."

I let the pause land.

"But that termination letter will be the last nail in both your coffins."

I walked out and pulled the door shut hard enough to rattle the frame.

Behind me: Landon's strangled curse, the sweep of papers hitting the floor.

I moved down the corridor, fingertips brushing the warm phone in my pocket, and typed a message to Maeve.

[They made their move.]

Three seconds. The screen lit up.

[Executive coercion plus quid pro quo, all on tape. That's our chain. Airtight.]