Chapter 22 Benched #2
Nico’s face closed.
He turned away from Lena. “I have nothing left to give this, Lena.”
Her chest cracked quietly.
“That’s not true.”
His laugh was barely a breath. “You don’t know that.”
Then he walked past Jace and disappeared down the hall.
Lena stood there until the corridor blurred.
Jace approached slowly.
“For what it’s worth,” he said, “he’s lying.”
She laughed once, broken. “About what?”
“Having nothing left.” Jace looked down the hallway where Nico had gone. “That guy has been emptying himself for other people since I met him. Problem is, you got close enough to notice, and now he doesn’t know whether to love you for it or hate you.”
Lena pressed her fingers beneath her eyes.
No tears.
Not here.
“Do you know who leaked the memo?” she asked.
Jace’s expression shifted.
Back to business.
Painful, necessary business.
“No. But I know Savannah was in the hallway near the media room that night.”
“She keeps saying Declan told her things.”
“Declan would.”
“Could he have accessed Talia’s account?”
“Not unless someone let him in.”
Lena looked toward the conference room.
Someone inside.
Someone with access.
Someone who knew where to find the file.
Someone who knew the wrist mattered.
Someone who knew the Declan audio existed, or at least what was on it.
Her stomach tightened.
“I need to find the login trail.”
Jace blinked. “You were just removed from media duties.”
“I know.”
“So naturally you’re about to commit light cyber-trespassing.”
“I have access to my own work logs.”
“That sounds like something a person says before committing medium cyber-trespassing.”
Lena almost smiled.
Almost.
Then her phone buzzed.
She looked down.
Maya.
Come to the media room. Now. I found something weird.
Lena’s pulse jumped.
She showed Jace the screen.
He exhaled. “Yeah, this is how people die in thrillers.”
“Good thing this is a romance.”
He gave her a look. “Is it?”
The question hurt more than it should have.
Lena did not answer.
She walked to the media room with Jace close behind her. The hallway felt longer than usual, every step carrying her farther from the conference room and closer to whatever damage waited next.
Maya was inside, seated at the desktop computer, her face pale.
That scared Lena immediately.
Maya did not do pale.
Maya did rage, sarcasm, and occasional dramatic despair over cafeteria sushi.
Pale meant real trouble.
“What did you find?” Lena asked.
Maya turned the monitor slightly.
“I was looking through the shared media drive logs because I am nosy and also because you are emotionally compromised.”
“Appreciated.”
“You’re welcome.” Maya pointed to the screen. “Talia’s account downloaded the memo during the donor event, like they said. But look at the device location.”
Lena leaned closer.
The login showed the media room desktop.
Expected.
Then, six minutes later, another access ping.
Same account.
Different device.
A tablet.
Lena’s stomach twisted. “Talia’s tablet?”
“No.” Maya clicked. “The device name is hidden, but the IP pings from the guest Wi-Fi used in the donor tent.”
Jace frowned. “So someone in the tent accessed the file after the media room download?”
“Or someone forwarded it to themselves and opened it there,” Maya said.
Lena stared at the timestamp.
8:18 p.m.
She remembered that time.
The garden party.
Savannah gliding through the crowd in pink.
Declan standing near the bar.
Nico’s hand at her back.
Her father pulling her aside.
That whole evening had been one long string of people watching.
“Can you see who received it?” Lena asked.
Maya hesitated.
That was not good.
“What?”
Maya clicked another file.
A screenshot opened.
It showed a partial message header from an internal media account forwarding an attachment.
The recipient email was mostly blurred by an export error, but the visible part was enough.
...vale@eastmont...
Lena stopped breathing.
Jace swore under his breath.
Declan.
Of course.
Of course it was Declan.
But the sender line was worse.
Because it was not Talia.
Not directly.
It was a generic staff account used for event media uploads.
One only people inside Westbridge should have been able to access.
Lena stared at the screen until the letters blurred.
“Someone inside sent it to him,” she said.
Maya nodded slowly. “Or someone used an inside account.”
Jace’s face had gone hard. “Either way, it’s not just Savannah being messy.”
No.
It was bigger.
Cleaner.
Meaner.
Lena’s phone buzzed again.
Unknown number.
For one horrible second, she thought it was the anonymous account.
But the message contained only an image.
A screenshot.
The same staff-account forwarding record Maya had found.
Below it, one line:
Ask who opened the door before you blame the person who walked through it.
Lena’s skin went cold.
Jace looked at the message over her shoulder.
“That from your anonymous stalker?”
“No.” Lena zoomed in on the screenshot.
A detail in the corner caught her eye.
The time.
The sender.
The location tag.
And one small reflection in the tablet screen captured accidentally by the screenshot.
A pale pink dress.
Savannah.
But beside her, half-visible, was a Westbridge staff lanyard.
Lena’s breath left her.
Maya leaned in. “Is that—”
“I don’t know.”
But she did.
Or at least part of her did.
The part that had been trained to notice details.
The part that knew public stories were built out of what people chose not to see.
The part that suddenly understood this leak had not been an accident, not gossip, not a student scandal spiraling out of control.
It was a handoff.
Someone inside Westbridge had opened the door.
And Declan Vale had walked through carrying a match.