Chapter 4

The hotel room was dark. The only light came from the cold glow of my laptop screen.

My phone buzzed. A breaking news alert popped up.

Graham’s PR team was working fast.

“BREAKING: Sources confirm Nora Bennett’s mental health is spiraling. Insiders claim she embezzled from her dying mother-in-law’s trust.”

I stared at the screen. He was trying to bury me.

He needed the public to see me as a crazy, unstable thief. That way, when I finally spoke, no one would believe me.

A year ago, this smear campaign would have destroyed me.

Tonight? I just laughed.

Keep lying, Graham. The bigger the lie, the louder the crash.

I picked up my phone. I called my contact at the City Gazette. He was an investigative reporter who lived to expose corrupt billionaires.

"Nora?" he answered quickly. "Graham's PR team just blasted that fake press release to every desk in the city. You need a lawyer."

"I don't need a lawyer," I said smoothly. "I need a projector."

There was a pause. "What do you have?"

"Everything," I replied. "I have the original hospital logs. And I have the unredacted wire transfers from Graham's personal email. He didn't just drain the Caregiver Trust. He used his mother's medical funds to pay his mistress's PR firm."

I heard him gasp on the other end.

"Nora, this is a massive felony," the reporter said, his voice buzzing with adrenaline. "Send the files to me right now. We can print this on the front page by Sunday."

"No," I said. My voice was ice.

"If you print it, his expensive lawyers will bury your paper in injunctions. They will tie us up in court for years. We are going to do this my way."

I walked over to the desk.

Resting on the wood was an invitation to tomorrow night’s Charity Gala. Next to it was the glossy promotional poster.

Graham and Celeste stood shoulder-to-shoulder on the poster. They looked polished and nauseatingly perfect.

The bold text above their heads made me sick: HONORING THE INVISIBLE CAREGIVER.

Right in the center of the poster, pinned to Celeste’s silk dress, was Margaret’s vintage sapphire brooch.

Celeste had told the press Margaret gifted it to her during a "lucid moment" last month.

But my stolen hospital logs proved Margaret was in a medically induced coma that entire week.

"Tomorrow night is the Charity Gala," I told the reporter. "The city's biggest investors will be there. Including Arthur Sterling."

"You're going to crash the gala?" he asked.

"I'm not crashing," I said softly. "I’m auditing."

I traced my finger over Celeste’s smiling face on the poster.

"Bring your camera crew," I ordered. "Tomorrow night, Celeste is going to wear that stolen brooch on stage. And I am going to make sure the whole city sees what it actually cost."

I hung up the phone.

Graham thought he was playing a brilliant game of chess.

He didn't realize I had already flipped the board.