S H A D E S

Blackmail

"Ms. Pierce...?" Paul's stunned face whipped by me in a blur as I bulleted by. Every step pain ripped through my heart and shot down through my legs, channelled along my spine.

"Ms. Pierce. Seriously, I—" Agitated, I swiped out a hand. Silencing him.

"Later. Later." I needed...god, I needed a minute. Just a f-cking minute. Behind a closed door and away from eyes and ears. It was happening. I was going to cry and my pride couldn't let that happen in full view of an audience. Bursting through my door, I slammed it behind me, entombing me inside. The room a hazed blur of viscous colour gone dull with agony. Stalking over to my desk, I swept my hands across it, pushing everything—files, phone and computer, on to the floor.

A sob kicked me in the gut and I pressed a hand over my mouth, swallowing another. And another. My brain spinning over the messy details. If the press took hold of this, then invariably she would have to face the board of directors. While having a personal relationship with Tristan Shade shouldn't have been an issue—this degree of embarrassment to Iconic's image, would be.

Someone had gone to considerable efforts to set them up for a massive sh!t storm.

And to what purpose? The reporters wanted to sell papers pushing a buzz worthy story, but what about the unknown accomplice? What did they stand to gain from peddling this humiliation? Knowing someone had betrayed us was a stunning blow I didn't quite know how to recover from, but nothing could have prepared me for Tristan's dismissive coldness.

Damn him. Damn that stubborn, arrogant—f-cking man!

Effective immediately, we're done. Just like that. A snap of the fingers, a pinch of the flame. Extinguished. Over. And here, one a few minutes before, I'd been daydreaming about white gowns and wedding bells?

God, what sort of idiot did that make me? Grief tore through me like a flood. Filling every crevice, every nook it could find until I was drowning. Cold, so cold. The shock wore me numb. My hands held at my side, trembled.

My door opened and I swiped quickly at my face, clearing up what little evidence had seeped through of my emotional distress but the flaming heat in my cheeks said no matter what I did at this point, the obvious was written there plain as day.

"Aren't you a sight?" Holding a file, Jim Verraster crossed the threshold and planted his feet. His stance smug and confident.

"Get out, Jim," I said, my voice wobbling beneath the iron hold I had on my resolve. "Now's not a good time."

He tisked softly. "Journalists threatening to sling mud'll do that. Probably should close this, no?"

I watched, rooted to the spot as he eased my office door shut and spread his hands in supplication. "I hate that it has to be like this, Laura. I really do." The smile twitching along his wide face belied that statement entirely.

"You," my voice was a whispered hush as I lowered into the first chair I could wobble to. Closed my eyes. "Oh, God."

"Probably wasn't the best move to wave the flag in your face, but I just had to see you crumble before the axe falls." Hiking up his trousers, Jim winged onto the arm of the settee, tossed the file on the table between us.

"I thought while you were away I would do a bit of digging into the Nishi matter. The account should have been mine," he said, jaw tensing. "This office, in fact, should have been mine, too. So I tapped into my guy in the IT department for a favour, gained access to the company's servers." His grin flashed brighter. "When the cat's away, the mice will play."