Chapter 22 #2
Mara comes around the desk and crouches in front of me.
“Laurel, look at me.”
I try. It takes effort.
“You’re safe in this room.”
I let out a laugh that cracks halfway through. “Am I?”
“In this room, yes.”
“My name is everywhere.”
“I know.”
“My career is over.”
“No.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know it is not over in this room.”
That strange lawyer certainty cuts through a sliver of panic.
I realize my hands are shaking and tuck them under my thighs like I can hide them from myself.
“She named me,” I whisper.
“Yes.”
“Can she do that?”
“She did. Whether she can do it without consequence is a different question.”
Mara stands and returns to her desk, already in motion.
She picks up the office phone. “I need screenshots of the latest video from Kimi Valley. Yes, Jenna Sinclair’s mother. Full capture. Comments, shares, timestamp, all of it. Preserve the livestream if it’s still active.”
Mara hangs up and turns back to me.
“Here’s what we’re going to do. Do not respond. Do not post. Do not call her. Do not call Jenna. Do not call Mason.”
At his name, my throat tightens.
“He’ll see it.”
She nods. “Yes, I’m sure he will.”
“He’ll lose his mind.”
“Probably.”
My phone lights again. This time with Sin’s name. Mara looks at it. Then at me.
“Do you want to answer?”
Every part of me says yes. My hand actually moves toward the phone.
Then I stop.
Because if I hear his voice right now, I will either break completely or ask him to fix something he can’t fix. And I can’t keep making him my emergency exit.
“No,” I whisper.
Mara nods once.
The call goes to voicemail. Immediately, a text appears.
Sin
Laurel, call me.
Please.
The please is what nearly does me in, so I turn the phone facedown. Mara watches me do it.
“Good,” she says softly.
“I don’t feel good.”
“You made a strong choice while panicking. That counts.”
“Does it?”
“Today, yes.”
Another tear slips out. Then another. Then the whole thing cracks open.
I cry in Mara Ellison’s very expensive office, into tissues that are soft enough to suggest her hourly rate is fully justified.
I cry because my name is public. Because strangers hate me.
Because Jenna’s pain is real and I’m part of it.
Because Sin loves me, maybe, but love doesn’t undo damage.
Because I worked so hard to be known for something other than surviving my childhood, and now the internet knows me as a scandal.
Mara lets me cry for exactly thirty seconds. Then she hands me water.
“Drink.”
I do.
“Now listen to me,” she says. “We are going to take this one piece at a time.”
I nod, wiping my face.
“First, we preserve evidence. Every video, post, message, and threat. Second, I contact company counsel. Third, we demand that the company provide security and a formal anti-retaliation plan. Fourth, we send a cease-and-desist to Kimi Valley if the content includes false statements of fact or targeted harassment.”
“She said I went after him.”
“Did you?”
I flinch.
Mara’s voice stays even. “Legally, Laurel. Did you pursue him for career gain? Did you harass him? Did you coerce him? Did you make false claims?”
“No.”
“Then we deal with what she said.”
I nod again.
“Fifth,” she continues, “we discuss Sex Activity Pro.”
My stomach drops.
“You think I should take it?”
“I think we need to examine it carefully. It may be a legitimate opportunity. It may also be affected by timing. You do not resign impulsively while under public pressure.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
Her look says she does not believe me. Fair.
“Fine. I thought about it,” I admit.
“Of course you did. Anyone would. But you do not let a scandal push you out of a position you earned unless leaving is truly in your best interest.”
I sit back, exhausted. “What if staying hurts the company?”
“That’s not your burden alone.”
“What if staying hurts him?”
Mara’s expression sharpens slightly.
“That question that will get you into trouble if you let it make your decisions.” She folds her hands on the desk.
“Mason Sinclair has his own attorney, his own board, his own power, and his own responsibility for what happened. You are not required to sacrifice your career to make his consequences easier.”
My throat tightens. “I love him.”
The words come out before I can stop them. There they are. In a lawyer’s office of all the romantic places.
Mara doesn’t blink.
“Does he know?”
I laugh, watery and awful. “I don’t think either of us knows anything right now.”
“That may be true emotionally. Legally, we still need clarity.”
“Love doesn’t help, does it?”
“Not in the way people hope.”
That’s brutally honest. I kind of adore her for it.
Mara slides a folder toward me. “This is my engagement agreement. Take it home. Read it when you’re not actively being attacked by the internet. For now, I’ll make initial contact with Sinclair’s counsel and the company. Do I have your permission?”
“Yes.”
“And Laurel?”
I look up.
“Do not go to the office.”
My first instinct is to argue. Then my phone buzzes again with another unknown number. Another message. Another piece of proof that the world knows my name now. The argument dies.
“Okay,” I whisper.
Mara’s face softens again by that tiny fraction.
“I know that feels like losing.”
“It does.”
“It isn’t. It’s strategy.”
“I hate strategy.”
“No, you don’t. You design products. Strategy is half your job.”
When I step out of Mara’s office, I brace myself for… what? I’m not sure. There are no cameras waiting. No reporters. No angry mobs. Just rain and traffic and a city that still looks normal even though my name is burning through strangers’ phones.
Still, I keep my head down as I walk. My phone vibrates again. Sin. I stare at his name.
God, I want to answer it so bad, but I can’t. If I hear his voice, I’ll forgive everything. And that won’t help either of us.
I get into the Uber and stare out the window.
My name is public.
My career is uncertain.
The man I love belongs to a life that is collapsing in real time.
And for the first time since this started, wanting him is not the loudest thing in me.
Fear is.
By the time I reach my building, there are flowers outside my door. For one stupid second, my heart leaps. Wait. Not flowers. A funeral arrangement of white lilies with a black envelope tucked between them.
I grab the card before I can stop myself.
For the woman who helped bury a marriage: Hope spreading your legs was worth it.
A sob breaks free as I shove the flowers aside. That’s how Opal finds me.
“Honey. What is it?”
I gesture toward the flowers, still sobbing.
She either sees the card or understands enough to know that it’s nothing nice. Her face goes murderous.
“Come on, honey. Let’s get you inside.”
She unlocks my door with the key I gave her for emergencies, which apparently now includes public moral execution. She gets me inside, throws the flowers down the hall, locks the door, and guides me to the couch.
I sit.
Then I fold forward, elbows on my knees, and finally let the shaking take over.
Opal kneels in front of me.
“Hey,” she says softly. “Look at me.”
I try.
“You’re not what they’re calling you. You know that.”
My face crumples.
“You made choices,” she says. “Messy ones. Human ones. But you are not a headline or rage content.”
I laugh through tears. “I ruined everything, Opal.”
“No.” Her voice is firm. “Everything was already broken. You were just standing too close when it fell.”
My phone buzzes on the coffee table and Sin’s name lights up the screen.
Opal asks, “Want me to text him?”
I wipe my face. “What would you say?”
“That you’re alive, sick, with me, and not ready to talk.”
I nod and unlock my phone for her. She sends exactly that. A minute passes before the reply comes through.
Opal reads it silently and her expression changes.
“What?” I ask.
She hesitates.
“Opal.”
She turns the phone so I can see.
Tell her I’m sorry. Tell her I’ll fix what I can. Tell her I know I can’t fix all of it. Tell her I love her.
Everything inside me goes still. All of it narrows to those last four words. Tell her I love her. I stare at them until they blur.
Opal’s voice is soft. “Laurel?”
I cover my mouth with one hand A sob breaks through anyway.
This isn’t how I wanted to hear it.
Not secondhand.
Not through my assistant.
Not on the worst day of my life, while strangers are ripping me apart online and Jenna’s mother is saying my name like a curse.
But there it is. The thing I was afraid to want. The thing I already knew. The thing that makes everything worse and somehow gives me one small place inside the wreckage where I can breathe.
He loves me.
And God help me, I love him too.
That’s the problem because it’s the only thing that still feels true.
I close my eyes and cry harder, while Opal sits beside me and holds my hand, and Sin’s message glows on the coffee table like a match in the middle of a room full of gasoline.