“This is Natasha Blake. President and sole owner of VB Capital. Majority shareholder of the investment fund you’ve been courting tonight.”
A collective inhale moved through the crowd.
Miranda’s face went pale so quickly it was almost frightening, as if the blood had fled her body all at once. She staggered back, fingertips catching on the edge of a table to steady herself.
Arthur’s tone didn’t change. “By Chairwoman Blake’s direct order,” he continued, “the five million dollar contract is canceled, effective immediately, due to a violation of our moral conduct clause.”
Travis made a choking sound. “That—no,” he stammered, voice cracking. He pointed at me, as if pointing could rewrite reality. “She’s… she’s nobody. She—”
Arthur’s eyes cut to him, sharp as a blade. “Mr. Cole,” he said, quiet but deadly, “I suggest you remain silent.”
Travis’s mouth closed, but his chest still heaved as if he couldn’t get enough air.
Miranda, however, found her voice.
“N-Natasha,” she breathed, like she’d just remembered we shared a childhood. Like she could pull the sister card out of her pocket and expect it to work.
I didn’t answer.
Because the room was already turning.
Chaos doesn’t always arrive with screaming. Sometimes it starts with movement.
A banker near the bar set down his glass with a clink that sounded louder than it should have. Another investor began whispering urgently into his phone. Someone else grabbed their spouse’s arm and tugged them toward the exit.
In less than a minute, the crowd that had been laughing at me began scattering, their interest in Miranda’s “empire” evaporating as quickly as champagne foam.
“If VB Capital is out,” someone said sharply, loud enough to carry, “we’re out.”
“That company’s finished.”
“Fraud.”
The word hit the air like smoke.
Miranda stood in the center of her glittering night, blinking as if her eyes couldn’t process what she was seeing. The cameras kept rolling. The livestream kept broadcasting. The audience online, invisible but present, watched her world unravel in real time.
Travis’s arm fell away from her waist. He looked at her with something that wasn’t love—it was calculation turning to fury.
“You told me she was a loser,” he hissed, voice low but trembling with anger. “You said she was nothing. You said she washed dishes.”
Miranda flinched like he’d struck her.
The laughter was gone now. No one was amused. People were watching the way they watch a car crash—horrified, unable to look away.
Miranda’s eyes snapped to me.
The rage that filled them was raw and desperate. She crossed the space between us in a few quick steps and grabbed my arm, nails pressing hard enough to hurt through the fabric.
“You tricked me,” she spat. Her voice shook. Makeup had begun to crack around her eyes, the perfect sheen of her face collapsing under stress. “You set me up. You came here to humiliate me.”
I looked down at her hand gripping my sleeve.
I thought about all the times she’d humiliated me—quietly, casually, as if it were her right. The time she’d told relatives I was “going through a phase” when I got my scholarship. The way she’d laughed when I wore a dress she deemed too plain. The way she’d made my existence feel like an embarrassment.
I lifted my free hand and, with deliberate calm, peeled her fingers off my arm one by one.
“I didn’t set you up,” I said. My voice didn’t rise. “You did this to yourself.”
Her eyes widened, wild. “You—”
“You slapped my hand away in front of cameras,” I continued, steady as a metronome. “You publicly degraded me. You publicly insulted the people who work for you. And you did it because you thought there would never be consequences.”
I glanced around at the room—the glitter, the chandeliers, the collapsing illusion.
“This,” I said softly, “is what consequences look like.”
Travis surged forward, face twisted. “My career—” he choked out, then turned toward the exit as if he could run away from the disaster.
But security had already moved.
A wall of broad shoulders blocked the doors. The head caterer stepped forward, holding a printed invoice, jaw clenched.
“Nobody leaves,” he announced, voice firm, “until the fifty thousand dollar balance is paid.”
Miranda’s head whipped toward him. “What?”
The caterer’s expression didn’t soften. “Your staff asked repeatedly. Your accounts said payment was pending. We’re done waiting.”
Miranda looked like she might faint.
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