Page 156 of Failure to Match

“From my experience, employees tend to shy away from reporting issues that could be turned against them to HR, especially if they suspect that management is looking for an excuse to fire them.”

“Disclosing a breach in our guidelines regarding a consultant’s relationship with their client is not optional, Mr. Sinclair.” Vivian wasn’t going to back down on this. “The employment contract Jamie signed made that abundantly clear. A scandal of this caliber has the potential to sink a company’s reputation in this industry. Regardless of whether or not Jamie herself crossed any boundaries, the situation should have been dealt with internally to prevent this exact outcome.”

She was right. And I didn’t feel great about Jackson downplaying my level of participation in all of this. But before I could jump in or figure out how to silently ask him to stop, Vivian said, “However, there is a way to make this problem... go away.”

Something about the way she said that grated against my soul like talons on a chalkboard. I narrowed my eyes.

“And what’s that?” Minerva asked.

“Miss Kaya has agreed to refrain from distributing the photo... if Jackson agrees to the arrangement they discussed over dinner last night.”

Silence.

Even though I saw Minerva’s mouth move, there was nothing but silence and the roar of fire unfurling in my chest.

Again. He was being blackmailed into a relationship he didn’t wantagain.

What the fuck waswrongwith these people? What was it about the money and power that made their souls rot? My fingers were numb, either because I was squeezing Jackson’s hand like it was my last lifeline, or because he was squeezing mine like it was his.

“Miray won’t be making good on any of her threats,” he said calmly. “I’ve fixed it.”

Vivian’s brows shot up. “I spoke with her less than an hour ago.”

“And I got off the phone with her shortly before we arrived. She won’t do anything with the photo, because if she does, I’ll leak this.”

Minerva placed her phone on the table, tapped at the screen, and sat back again. Harry didn’t so much as stir in her arms. I had to squint my eyes and focus for a second to make sure he was breathing.

And then, it happened.

“I have a bone to pick with you,” Jackson’s slurred, gruff voice said on the speaker. “I was fine before her. I wasfine, but nobody wanted to believe it. Not you, not Molly, not Mabel, not Bensen or Mikey or Rahul or anybody else. But I was fucking fine! And now? Now I’m… She fucking broke me, Minerva. I’ve well and truly lost my mind. When I go to bed, it’s her. When I wake up, it’s her. When I blink or breathe or dare to merelyexist, it’s her, and… and I never understood how Beatrice managed tosink her claws so deep into Richard’s skin. It never made sense to me. She turned a god into her fucking lapdog and put him on an electric leash,and he fucking let her.

“It was a disease with the two of them. He could only see what she wanted him to see, believed every lie she told him, and whenever she did something to piss him off, he took it out on me. That’s how fucking terrified he was that she’d leave him—he couldn’t even properly confront her about any of her affairs. She thought she’d trapped him by giving birth to me, but to him, it was always the other way around.

“He was fucking pathetic. Even as a kid, I could see it. And I swore—I swore—it was never going to be me. Ifthatwas love, then the whole world was being lied to. But it wasn’t, was it? That was a cancerous mix of deceit, and manipulation, and greed, and whatever the fuck else, but it wasn’t love. You know how I know? Because my Jamie would never manipulate me like that for anything, and I would never—couldnever do it to her. Miray tried to kiss me during our date and my reaction to it was fucking visceral. I had to stop myself from shoving her off of me. Everything about it was wrong andthat’show I know what my parents had wasn’t love, because even the thought of being with someone else makes me physically ill, Minerva.

“I’m done. Eight billion people in the world and my Jamie’s the best fucking one. It’s her, or it’s no one. I won’t be blackmailed and manipulated into making the single biggest mistake of my life, so fuck you, fuck the shares, and fuck the family legacy. I choose Jamie.”

Click.

Dead silence.

I was lightheaded; hadn’t breathed in almost ten minutes, afraid that the sound of my lungs would interfere with my need to memorize Jackson’s every word. I desperately needed to hearit again from the very beginning to the very end, just to be sure I’d understood him correctly.

Jackson cleared his throat as I continued to stare at nothing, dazed, my pulse racing toward the nearest heart attack.

“I informed Miray that if she shared her picture, I’d share my audio. Turns out she’s not keen on people knowing that her displays of affection made me feel ill, nor does she want to enter into any sort of arrangement with a man who’s publicly known to be desperately in love with someone else.”

I felt nothing and too much all at once. That time I hadn’t misheard him. I was ninety-nine-point-nine-nine-nine-nine-nine percent sure of it.

Vivian wasn’t saying anything, and I couldn’t bring myself to look at her. Or Minerva. Or Jackson. All I could focus on was Jackson’s voice and the feel of his fingers interlaced with mine.

“If she hasn’t made another attempt to reach you already, she will,” he finished.

“Vivian, a word?” Minerva said.

I barely heard her, barely registered Vivian’s response, or the fact that the two of them were already leaving. My mind was busy... processing.

“You okay?”

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