Chapter 10

Then, in a perfectly natural turn of events, Richard could simply argue that I wasn't up to the job and ask to have me replaced.

But replaced by whom? Probably someone from his own team. Or he might just take the reins himself.

The Fordwell Group project was the biggest account I'd landed since joining the company. Pulling it off would all but guarantee a promotion and a raise by the end of the year.

But if it went down the drain, that achievement would have nothing to do with me.

The more I turned it over in my mind, the more convinced I became that this was exactly what was going on.

With Richard constantly changing the direction, the proposal was bound to get worse with each revision.

The client, dissatisfied, would blame the execution team, and the execution team, frustrated in turn, would blame the client for being impossible to please.

With both sides getting more and more worked up, an explosion was inevitable, something like what had happened yesterday with my message.

Maybe Richard hadn't expected me to accidentally send that complaint to the group chat.

But even without that mishap, given the way things were heading, the project was bound to hit a breaking point sooner or later.

And when that time came, Richard would step in to clean up the mess.

He would come out looking like the only one who knew what he was doing, and I would be left holding the bag.

Sitting there on the subway, I felt my anger building with every stop.

But I couldn't act on suspicion alone. I needed solid, concrete proof.

It was already half past ten by the time I got back to the office.

In the elevator, I ran into another colleague from my department, Natalie Ford.

Strictly speaking, she wasn't really my colleague in the day-to-day sense. She led another one of Richard's teams.

Natalie caught sight of me and gave a little smile. "Claire, I heard you went over to Fordwell Group to apologize. How did it go?"

Word got around fast.

"Fine," I said.

"Mr. Bennett didn't give you a hard time, did he?"

"No."

"That's good to hear. Honestly, this sort of thing isn't such a big deal. It'll be old news in a couple of days."

She sounded perfectly casual about it, but her eyes stopped on my face for a split second. And in that brief look, there was something else that didn't quite feel like concern.

I didn't dwell on it. I just stepped out of the elevator and walked straight back to my desk.

Emily was already there waiting for me.

She rolled her chair over, leaned in, and dropped her voice. "I saw the emails."

"How did you get them?"

"I had Susan pull them for me. I told her it was for a project post-mortem and that I needed to verify the timeline. She didn't ask questions."

"And?"

She handed me her phone, and I started scrolling through the screenshots one by one.

The first one was an email Charles had sent to Richard right after V3 was delivered.

The message was clear. "Mr. Lane, the overall direction of V3 is solid. Only two sections of copy need tweaking. See the comments in the attachment."

Just copy tweaks. But in the email Richard had forwarded to me, the original message from Charles was nowhere to be found.

Instead, Richard had written me a separate note that said: "The client isn't happy with V3. They feel the overall positioning is too conservative and that we need to scrap it and start over."

The content was the exact opposite of what Charles had actually said.

The second screenshot was Charles' email after V6 was delivered. "The direction of V6 works. Proceed to flesh out the details from here, with a focus on improving the visual hierarchy and making the brand messaging more prominent."

That aligned perfectly with what had been said in the group chat.

But the revision instructions Richard had given me at the time claimed, "The client has floated some new ideas privately.

"They want to switch to a warmer color palette and shift the tone from high-end luxury to a more approachable, down-to-earth feel. I've already confirmed it with them. Go ahead with the new direction."

The two emails couldn't have been more different.