“They can’t suspend me. I’m the CFO. I built the fiscal strategy that saved the company last quarter!”
“You’re a liability,” Thorne said flatly. “Stock is down 4% in pre-market trading. The hashtag #BoycottSterlingDynamics is trending. The CEO is panicked.”
Richard stopped pacing. He gripped the edge of the counter, his knuckles white.
“Fix it, Marcus. That’s why I pay you five thousand dollars an hour. Fix it.”
Thorne set his cup down. “We have two options. Option A: You issue a groveling public apology. You donate a massive sum to a women’s shelter. You go to anger management. You plead guilty to a lesser charge, do some community service, and hope this blows over in six months.”
Richard sneered. “I am not apologizing to that… that obstructionist. She baited me. She saw the suit, she saw the rush, and she stood there to prove a point. I will not apologize for being efficient.”
Thorne sighed, a sound like dry leaves rustling. “I thought you might say that. Which brings us to Option B.”
“Which is?”
“We go to war. We destroy her credibility. We dig into her past. We find every parking ticket, every harsh sentence she’s ever handed down as a prosecutor. We paint her as an aggressive, power-hungry fed who abused her badge to intimidate a private citizen. We make her the villain.”
Richard poured himself a scotch, despite it being 9:30 in the morning. He took a swig, the amber liquid burning his throat.
“Do it,” Richard said. “Bury her.”
Back in the hospital, the pain was changing.
The sharp, stabbing agony of the abruption had dulled into a constant, heavy ache, like a bruise that went down to the bone. But the cramping was worse.
“Contractions,” the nurse said, reading the printout from the monitor. “Irregular, but they’re there. Your uterus is irritable from the trauma.”
“Is she coming?” I asked, panic spiking my heart rate. “It’s too soon. She’s only thirty-one weeks. Her lungs…”
“We gave you the steroid shots for her lungs,” the nurse said soothingly. “We’re giving you magnesium to stop the contractions. It makes you feel like you have the flu, I’m afraid.”
She wasn’t lying. I felt like my blood was on fire. My skin was hot, my head was heavy, and I felt a profound, bone-deep weakness.
Elias was awake now, sitting on the edge of the bed, feeding me ice chips.
“You look like you’re fighting a dragon,” he whispered, wiping sweat from my forehead.
“I feel like the dragon is winning,” I mumbled.
My phone buzzed again. And again. And again.
“Maya, stop,” Elias said, trying to take the phone away.
“I need to see,” I insisted, gripping it weak-fingered. “I need to know what they’re doing.”
I opened Twitter. The top trending story had shifted.
BREAKING: Defense Attorney Accuses Pregnant Prosecutor of “Badge Abuse” and “Staging” Airport Fall.
I clicked the link. It was a statement from Marcus Thorne’s firm.
> “Mr. Sterling is a victim of a orchestrated shakedown. The video circulating is edited and lacks context. Ms. Vance, using her position as a federal officer, aggressively blocked a priority boarding lane and initiated a confrontation. When Mr. Sterling attempted to pass, she staged a dramatic fall to solicit a lawsuit. We have witnesses who will testify to her belligerent behavior prior to the incident.”
I dropped the phone. It hit the sheets with a soft thud.
“Belligerent,” I whispered. “Staged.”
I looked at the IV line in my arm. I looked at the magnesium dripping into my veins to stop my body from expelling my daughter too soon. I looked at the bruise spreading across my hip, turning a violent shade of purple-black.
“He’s doubling down,” Elias said, reading the screen over my shoulder. His voice was trembling with rage. “He’s actually blaming you.”
“He’s trying to break me,” I said. “He knows he can’t win on the facts. The video is too clear. So he’s trying to win in the court of public opinion. He wants me to settle. He wants me to drop the charges to make it go away.”
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