Richard Hale didn't waste a single second. The moment Logan finished speaking, Richard turned to face the lobby with an expression that had frozen into something beyond cold. It was the face of a man who had just watched his own house get robbed by people he had trusted with the keys."Jessica Barnes." His voice cut across the marble like a whip crack. "Director Alan Walsh. You are both terminated from Imperial Group. Effective immediately."The words landed with the force of a guillotine blade dropping.Jessica's knees gave out completely. She grabbed the edge of the counter with both hands, her nails scraping against the marble, her body folding as if the bones inside her had turned to liquid."Mr. Hale, please!" Her voice came out in a strangled wail. "I've worked here for four years! I have a lease! I have payments! You can't just fire me over one bad morning! I made a mistake! Everyone makes mistakes!""You didn't make a mistake." Richard's voice carried no warmth, no sympathy, n

The ceiling of Vivian's penthouse had become her enemy.She lay flat on her back in the dark, the sheets twisted around her legs, her eyes fixed on the smooth white surface above her as if it held the answers to every question that had been eating her alive since the Skyline Grand. Sleep had come in fragments, broken pieces that dissolved the moment her mind drifted back to the image of Victor Kane bowing to Logan Mercer.Bowing.To Logan.The memory replayed behind her eyelids on a loop she couldn't stop. Victor's lowered head. The reverence in his voice. The way Marcus Reed had obeyed Logan's gesture at Vantage without hesitation. The way security at Imperial Group had stepped aside and called him by name.None of it made sense. None of it fit the Logan she knew. The Logan who had eaten her leftovers and worn clothes she bought and sat quietly at family dinners while her mother called him worthless.That Logan couldn't command the respect of a parking attendant, let alone the most f

Ashley set her coffee cup down with a sharp clink that cut through the heavy silence at their table. Her eyes had changed.The puffiness from crying was still there, but behind it something new had surfaced. Focus. The cold, surgical focus of a woman who had stopped feeling sorry for herself and started making plans."We need to stop guessing." Ashley leaned forward, her elbows pressing into the table. "Sitting here talking about what Logan might be doing and who might be helping him isn't going to get us anywhere. We've been going in circles since we sat down. Guessing is for people who don't have options. We have options."She looked at Vivian, then at Trevor, holding each of their gazes long enough to make her point land."We need to investigate him. Properly. Not gossip. Not speculation. A real, professional investigation into every corner of Logan Mercer's life. Where he goes. Who he meets. Where his money comes from. What he did during all those years he was supposedly sitting a

The office sat on the fourth floor of a building that looked like it had been forgotten by the rest of the city. The elevator groaned on the way up, the hallway carpet was worn thin in the middle, and the brass numbers on the door were tarnished enough to suggest that whoever worked here had been doing it for a very long time.Trevor pushed the door open and held it for Vivian and Ashley.The room inside was a surprise.Whatever the building's exterior lacked, Owen Brooks had made up for with careful, deliberate presentation. The office was clean, organized, and decorated with the precise taste of a man who understood that first impressions were part of the service. Dark wood shelves lined the walls, filled with leather bound folders arranged by year. Framed certificates hung in neat rows beside photographs of Owen shaking hands with men and women whose faces appeared regularly in business magazines and society pages.Owen himself stood behind a wide mahogany desk, rising to greet the

Trevor laughed, his earlier tension dissolving into something that resembled his old confidence. "Can you imagine the look on his face? That smug little smile he had at the party when he was lecturing us? When he was standing there pretending to be important while we were being humiliated? Imagine that smile disappearing when we put the evidence on the table.""It won't just disappear." Vivian's eyes gleamed with cold satisfaction. "It will shatter. Along with everything he's built. Every connection. Every friendship. Every ounce of respect he's stolen from people who were too stupid to see through him.""We should invite the press." Ashley was practically bouncing in her chair now. "Make it a public event. Rent a venue. Invite every person who was at the Skyline Grand and show them exactly what kind of insect they were applauding.""An insect in a human suit." Trevor grinned. "That's what he is. A termite that crawled inside a nice jacket and convinced everyone he was an architect. M