Chapter 27
My heels click against the stone stairs as I run to find Oliver. Malcolm’s offer, if you can even call it that, replays in
my mind like a siren. Handing over half of Wyst to Malcolm is ridiculous; I’d rather burn the whole thing to the ground.
Multiple sets of footsteps echo up the stairs behind me. I freeze, fists ready at my sides to physically fight off Malcolm
if I have to. But instead of the man I assumed would be hunting me down, two security guards appear at the end of the hall.
“Miss, can we see your pass, please?” one of the men says, holding his hand out to me.
I run to the next door, banging on it like my life depends on it. Oliver answers, still in his full tuxedo but his bow tie
undone around his neck.
“Can I come in?” I ask, a relieved smile plastering my tearstained face; he doesn’t smile back.
At that moment, my stomach sinks, the weight of my mistakes threatening to push me through the floorboards.
Everything I’ve done, everything he doesn’t know I’ve done, has created this invisible chasm between us.
One of the men steps forward. “Miss, if you don’t have a pass, you need to leave this area immediately.”
My head swivels back around, shooting a pleading look at Oliver.
He studies me a final time, and with a bobbing throat, he says, “She’s with me.” He pulls a shiny black lanyard out of his
jacket pocket with one hand, placing the other on my arm. It’s not a comforting touch, just a formality he is reluctant to
take part in.
The man looks at him and shakes his head. “I’m sorry, sir. There must have been a misunderstanding.”
Oliver ushers me into the room, hand still gently gripped on my forearm. “No problem,” he says to the two men. He still hasn’t
looked me in the eye but he leads me into the room. “Have a good evening.”
“Good evening, sir,” the men both say, voices overlapping each other.
Neither of us breathe as he shuts the door with a click. I watch as it disappears into the paneled wall, giving the illusion
of a secret entryway. The smell of leather and old books hits my nostrils; I wish it was his peppery scent.
A gigantic curved oak desk with a green leather top sits in front of closed gold sash curtains at the other side of the room.
Ornate clusters of settees and grand leather lounge chairs are scattered around the room.
A wooden bar covers the corner with sparkling crystal decanters like diamonds atop a crown.
Oliver said it was a study, but it feels more like an old-school smoking lounge.
Gold sconce lights cast an orange glow over the never-ending shelves of books.
The orchestra’s music swells through the minute cracks around the door like ghosts howling a collective memory.
My heart rate slows when I finally lean against the door. A minor sense of relief that even though tonight has been a complete
disaster, at least I’m not actively being held against my will or being thrown out of one of the fanciest venues in the city.
Glancing down, my hands are still shaking as I turn the lock to make sure if Malcolm manages to follow me up here, he’ll be
caught by security before he can reach us.
“Here.” Oliver takes a glass bottle of water from the bar, undoes the cap, and hands it to me. He goes to speak further but
stops himself, relaxing his rising shoulders. “Drink that, then explain why you’re up here.”
My stomach clenches; he’s pissed. I told him I wanted to talk, but no less than sixty seconds later, I was dancing with a
man I’d told Oliver I never wanted to see again. I analyze the situation from his perspective; from the balcony above, all
he could see was me talking, dancing, and smiling with the man who ruined my life like we were old friends. There is no way
from up there Oliver would have been able to see my hands shaking or the tears glazing over my eyes. He wouldn’t have been
able to hear the harsh words being spat at me. My head pounds when I remember Malcolm’s lips so close to mine as he dipped
me on the dancefloor. Based on his reaction to me now, Oliver must have left the moment he saw the disgusting scene. If he’s
acting like this, he must not have witnessed me slamming down on Malcolm’s shoe and legging it for the exit.
Then again, Oliver could be just as pissed about me running away and ignoring him for two weeks, for being weird with him yesterday at the final round, or bashing his door down and making a scene with security.
Maybe all of the above. Either way, I owe him an explanation for everything.
And I deserve every consequence that comes next.
My throat bobs as I gulp down the water, using it as an opportunity to get my thoughts together. He doesn’t say anything,
just paces the room, hands in his pockets, waiting for me to begin.
“Thank you for staying,” I say in between breaths.
His jaw ticks. “I’m here with Dominic. I can’t leave until he does.”
My chest sinks as I nod. “Right.” I take another long swig of the bottle, wishing it was something stronger. “We need to talk
about some stuff.”
He spits out a laugh, opening a decanter of amber liquid and pouring it into a glass. “Yeah, no shit.” He paces the floor,
the ice in his glass clinking as he moves. “Let’s just get this over with; you’re back together with your ex?”
I almost spit out the water onto the parquet floorboards. “What? Why would you think that?”
“You practically sprinted out of the apartment the other week when things between us started getting . . .” He stops himself.
“Then you act all aloof yesterday like you’re hiding something from me. And then tonight, you’re laughing and dancing with
him at the ball. You let him kiss you. What the hell else am I meant to think?”
I replay the events of the past two weeks. To an outsider’s view, it does look as simple as that. I wish it was as simple as that.
“Surely, you understand where I’m coming from here, why I’m confused as hell,” Oliver adds, knocking back his drink and running
a hand over his face. “I’ve spent the past two weeks running through the dinner at my place, wondering where I went wrong.
What did I do to make you bolt like a spooked horse.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong.” I swallow the fear before unleashing the truth. “Malcolm is blackmailing me.”
He pauses his pacing, the dark frustration in his eyes turning into liquid rage.
“The photos?” he asks in a low, morbid tone.
I take a breath, not moving from the door. “No, it’s . . . something else.”
His anger briefly subsides as he takes a step forward, his expression softening ever so slightly. “What else can he do to
you? What else is there? If he did something to you again, I swear I—” He runs a hand over his mouth. “Please just put me
out of my misery. Please tell me I’m not a complete chump for falling for someone I know is keeping secrets from me.”
I blink at his confession. He doesn’t flinch. He either doesn’t realize what he just said or is so confident in his feelings
that this is going to hurt so much more.
My voice comes out low and weak. “It’s something I did, not him.”
Oliver’s eyes creased, scanning my face for some sort of answer.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath. “I’ve wanted to tell you. It’s why I had to leave that night before things went any
further; it’s why I—” My voice cracks and I stop, trying to regain my composure.
He steps forward, takes my hand, and holds my gaze. “I told you, you can trust me.” He says it in a way that makes my heart shatter. Knowing in my bones that I can trust him, but after I say this, he will never trust me again.
My voice cracks as I attempt to explain. “Malcolm is blackmailing me because he knows the truth. The truth about me.”
Oliver’s face tenses, the pulse in his wrist jumping under my fingers.
I close my eyes, taking my final breath as a person in denial. “Spencer isn’t my boss; he’s my brother. He’s an actor who
stepped in to pretend to be the CEO and founder of Wyst.”
He blinks, trying to absorb the information. “So where is the real CEO?”
“Right here.” I realize I’m shaking, not just my hands but my entire body. Like the lies are poison leaking out of my pores.
“Spencer is pretending to be me. Wyst is my company.”
His face softens; whether it’s shock, sympathy, or pity . . . I don’t know which one is worse.
He steps forward, shaking his head, his brows forming a tight line. “Vi, I—”
I step back, holding my hand up. “I’m not finished. My name isn’t Violet; it’s Jess. Jess Cole.”
He leans against the ornate desk, rubbing his face with his hands. I stand in silence with nothing more to say, everything
I’ve been keeping a secret laid out in the chasm between us, hoping that maybe the truth will fill the space.
“Everything you told me about you, about—” He stops himself, swallowing the question. He gestures between us. “Was any of
this true?” I know what he’s trying to ask from the hurt in his eyes.
Everything you told me, everything we shared, every time I touched you.
I blink away the heat building behind my eyes. “It’s the only thing I haven’t been lying about.”
He stares at his hands clasped in front of him. “Why?”
I wring my fingers, moving tentatively to lean next to him instead of awkwardly standing in the middle of the room. “Wyst
was getting zero traction and I was running out of money.” I shake my head, correcting myself. “I’m hemorrhaging money. It’s simple A/B testing, really. The only variable I could see was that I’m a woman. So when I made a mistake on the
application and they thought I was ‘Mr. Cole,’ I went along with it. My bills were piling up. I was desperate.”
“So you got Spencer to take the call with me,” he adds, his face shadowed by the lamplight.
I suck in my flaming cheeks. “Not exactly . . .”
He slowly turns to me, confused for a second before his eyes go wide. “That was you?” His mouth hangs agape, his head shaking. “How?”
“I got our tech guy to set up a voice changer app.” I shrug, a tight, awkward half-smile plastered across my mouth.
Oliver stares into the abyss, his eyes’ focus jumping between the portraits on the wall in front of us as he tries to recall
the conversation.
Finally, he cuts a look back to me. “On the call . . . I heard a woman’s voice halfway through.” He tilts his head, dark eyes
laser focused.
I lower my head. I can’t look at him so lock in on the frayed edges of the Persian rug. “Yeah, the app broke.”
He stares at me, expressionless and silent, for what feels like hours.
I patch the silence, my shoulders pulled tight and high like a slingshot. “I’m so sorry; everything happened so quickly and
I panicked, I just—”
Oliver bursts out laughing.