Chapter 17 Lies and Lessons
LIES AND LESSONS
JAMIE
I’m back at the little desk outside Vanessa’s office Friday morning, doing my best not to spiral about the meeting in a few hours.
The desk I breezed past without a thought for weeks.
Right before I stole her chair and pretended I belonged there.
The faux-wood surface looks smaller now, like it shrank while I ignored it—or maybe I shrank.
I thought I’d grown. Instead, here I am, right where I’m supposed to be: outside Vanessa’s door, typing notes, answering calls for “Ms. Voss” and being “useful.”
Except I don’t feel useful.
Every time I press a key, I hear Magnus’s voice in my head, low and raw: You didn’t think I was enough.
And the worst part? He’s not wrong.
My mind swirls with all the mistakes I made. I should have been honest. I should have told him. I should have trusted what we were building.
The phone buzzes. I answer, take down a message, hang up, and pretend my hands aren’t shaking. Vanessa’s schedule on my screen blurs. I blink it away and try to focus, but it’s like my chest is made of broken glass.
“Jamie.”
Amara’s voice slices through, sharp and certain, but carrying that underlying warmth that makes it hard to ignore. I glance up. She’s standing before my desk, wings tucked tight, coffee balanced casually in one clawed hand, an eyebrow arched like she’s been watching me unravel for far too long.
“You’re coming with me.”
I gesture helplessly at the desk. “I can’t. Vanessa—”
“—will live,” Amara interrupts. She steps closer, curls bouncing, her tone brisk in that Being Resources way.
“You’re pale, you’re twitching, and you’re one passive-aggressive comment away from dissolving into a puddle on the floor.
Office gossip already has you starring in three different Lifetime movies. Get up.”
I want to protest, but she’s already grabbed my arm, tugging me out of the chair and wrapping a wing around me.
Her office is around the corner, cozy compared to Vanessa’s museum of power plays. There are books stacked everywhere, a plant she’s somehow kept alive, and the faint smell of cinnamon. She gestures at the couch, and I collapse onto it.
Amara sits across from me, crosses her legs, wings tucked, and studies me. “So. Want to tell me why you look like the unpaid intern in our safety training video?”
A weak laugh escapes before I can stop it. “Because I am proof Being Resources exists for a reason.”
“Jamie.” Her smile softens. “Don’t flatter yourself. br was invented for dragons who hoard staplers.”
I run my hands over my face, muffling the words. “I screwed up. I was so eager to prove myself, I didn’t even think about… what I was doing.” My head swirls anyway—with Magnus. With his trust. With the way I wanted him to look at me and see more than a mailroom drone turned admin.
Amara leans forward. “You think that’s the worst part? That you weren’t upfront about your role?”
I swallow hard. “Isn’t it?”
She shakes her head. “No. Magnus isn’t dense—he’s a brilliant CEO who can smell bullshit at fifty paces. What stings isn’t the lie about your job. It’s that you don’t believe you—just you—are enough. And if you don’t believe it, why should anyone else?”
Her words land like a punch to my stomach. I glance down at my hands. “I wanted to be someone he could be proud of. Not just the kid from the mailroom who got a lucky break to be Vanessa’s assistant.”
“First,” Amara says, holding up a talon-sharp finger, “assistants run the world. Don’t you dare insult yourself. Second, ambition isn’t the enemy. You can want more for your career and still be honest about where you are.”
Her gaze sharpens, pinning me. “Jamie, you came to Labyrinth Solutions because you wanted more. You put in your time in the mailroom. I pulled strings to get you this shot, and your first instinct was to fake it instead of own it. What if you’d just told the truth?
Maybe things would’ve ended the same—or better.
But if you keep shapeshifting to please everyone else, you’re going to disappear. ”
My throat tightens. “What if the real me isn’t enough?”
Amara exhales slowly, shaking her head. “That’s the nastiest lie you tell yourself. And it’s the only one that’ll ruin you.”
Silence stretches, thick as wet cement. My chest aches, but this time it’s not heartbreak—it’s the truth gnawing at my gut.
“I want to fix this,” I whisper.
Amara’s smile is small but fierce. “Then do it. Not as Junior Strategist Jamie. Not as Assistant Jamie. Just as… you. Messy, scared you. If they can’t handle that, fine—you’ll survive. But if you keep hiding, you’ll lose everything for sure.”
I nod, blinking hard.
She claps her hands once, businesslike. “Good. Now, wipe your face before Vanessa comes and finds you. She’ll add ‘manage emotional leakage’ as a development goal in your next performance review.”
A weak laugh bubbles up before I can stop it, and it feels good.
“There he is,” Amara says, grinning like a cat with cream. “The Jamie Torres I know. The one who has teeth.”
“Do I, though?” I mumble.
“Yeah.” She stands, handing me a tissue. “Now use them.”