The drive blurred past me. My hands clamped the steering wheel too tightly. My jaw hurt from clenching it. Rage sat in the passenger seat beside me.
**
When I walked through the office lobby, everything felt too perfect—polished floors, quiet voices, a place that pretended problems didn’t exist.
Mark stood waiting near the front desk.
“They pulled the reimbursement reports,” he told me. “Hotel bookings, wellness claims, expensive gifts.”
I swallowed. “All tied to Alyssa?”
“They traced everything back to her vendor profile,” Mark said grimly.
“Texts too?”
“Oh yeah,” he replied. “Expense reports, vendor records, his company phone history. HR has it all.”
He nodded toward the glass conference room.
Inside, Cole was pacing, gesturing with his hands like he was pitching something. HR sat across from him without expression. Darren, the CEO, looked worn out. A VP I’d only seen at holiday parties sat quietly watching like a judge.
Then the door swung open.
