Chapter 5

The conference-room doors closed behind me.

Only then did I let myself breathe.

My cheek burned where Tristan had struck me.

I could still hear the silence that had followed—the investors staring, Lydia shrinking behind him, Tristan looking at his own hand as though it belonged to someone else.

I stepped into the waiting cab.

As it pulled away from the Bellmere Grand Hotel, my phone rang.

Evelyn.

“The administrator has suspended Lydia’s verification,” she said. “No one will be approved as the sole writer until the evidence is reviewed.”

“Good.”

“I’m preparing the formal authorship objection now. And after…