Chapter 12

<p>"What did I ever do to you? Did I hit you? Did I curse you out? Was I out fooling around every night? Victoria, in three years of marriage, I never did a single thing to wrong you!"</p><p>"Not a single thing?" Victoria's voice finally rose. "Stephen, you traveled with her. You danced with her. You had her stay with your mother in the hospital. In front of everyone, you always put her by your side instead of me. No, you never hit me. You never cursed at me. But you made me spend every day of those three years wondering if I wasn't good enough, if I'd done something wrong, if I just wasn't worth loving."</p><p>She cut herself off and took a deep breath.</p><p>"Do you know what it feels like to doubt yourself every single day? To look in the mirror and think you're not pretty enough every single day? Of course you don't. Because you're Stephen Foster. You never have to doubt yourself. You're always right, always good, always the most perfect person in everyone's eyes."</p><p>The office fell completely silent.</p><p>Stephen looked at her. His lips moved, but no words came out.</p><p>Victoria sat back down, picked up the file on her desk, and resumed reading, her tone calm again. "Mr. Foster, leave. If you don't, I'll have security escort you out."</p><p>Stephen stood there for a long time, staring at her. In the end, he turned and left. His shoes struck the floor hard, every step sounding like he was fighting something he couldn't beat.</p><p>Once the office door closed behind him, Victoria set down the file and closed her eyes.</p><p>Her hands were trembling slightly.</p><p>Not because she was scared. Not because she was sad. But because for one second just now, she had almost gone soft on him.</p><p>Almost.</p><p>But not this time.</p><p>The month that followed was the hardest month Foster Group had seen in years.</p><p>Victoria had more cards in her hand than just those few articles. In her last life, she'd spent three full years collecting dirt on Foster Group, from financial issues to management problems, from related-party deals to benefit transfers. Every single piece was backed by evidence. In her last life, she never got to use any of it, because she died without ever figuring out how. This time was different. She had a company. She had a team. She had channels. And she had the ability to turn all of it into something real.</p><p>She put Chris from sales in charge of forming a dedicated research team. They mapped out Foster Group's business structure, customer base, and supplier network from top to bottom. Then Victoria started poaching Foster Group's clients one by one.</p><p>The first target was Foster Group's biggest raw materials supplier, a company they'd worked with for eight years, with annual purchases exceeding 67 million dollars. Through a middleman she'd known in her last life, Victoria connected with the supplier's boss and invited him to dinner. During the meal, she didn't push anything. They just talked industry trends and exchanged business cards.</p><p>At the second meeting, she laid Lane Trading's supply chain proposal in front of him. It was clean, polished, and ruthless. Her price was eight percent lower than Foster Group's, the delivery cycle was ten days shorter, and the payment terms were more flexible.</p><p>The man hesitated.</p><p>Victoria didn't pressure him. Instead, she took out another document, Foster Group's payment records from the past three years. They showed an average payment cycle of 120 days, far beyond the 60 days stated in the contract.</p><p>"You've supplied Foster Group for eight years, and they've owed you money for eight years." Victoria pushed the file across the table. "A 120-day payment cycle means a third of your cash flow is tied up by them. If that money were used elsewhere, you know better than I do how much value it could create."</p><p>The man read the document, sat in silence for five minutes, then said, "Ms. Lane, let's talk details."</p><p>The second client, the third, the fourth. Victoria used the same approach every time. She didn't fight with dirty pricing, and she didn't play cheap sabotage games. She just laid out the facts. Foster Group was not a good partner. Lane Trading was.</p><p>In one month, Victoria took four major clients away from Foster Group. The total contract value exceeded 100 million dollars.</p><p>Over that same month, Foster Group's stock fell eighteen percent, wiping out more than 1 billion dollars in market value. Several institutions downgraded Foster Group's rating, and one analyst wrote in a report: "Foster Group is facing a serious reputation crisis and rapid customer loss. Its short-term outlook isn't promising."</p><p>Victoria read the report and smiled.</p><p>This was only the beginning.</p>