Chapter 17
I arrived at the studio stupid early, hoping the quiet morning hours would help settle whatever restless chaos had kept me doing interpretive dance with my bedsheets all night.
Spoiler alert: it didn’t work.
Despite my Oscar-worthy performance of normalcy—nodding to security, smiling at interns like I wasn’t slowly losing my goddamn mind—I couldn’t shake this feeling that everything was about to implode spectacularly.
Finn’s midnight fire escape visit. Leo’s suspicious jacket interrogation. The growing pile of secrets I was carrying around like radioactive luggage.
Everything felt fucking precarious, like I was doing circus acts on glass that could shatter if someone looked at it wrong.
I needed coffee and five minutes to get my shit together before facing whatever fresh hell the day had planned for me. But of course, because the universe apparently has a sick sense of humor, I wasn’t alone in the break room.
Adelyn stood by the coffee machine like some kind of corporate vulture, eyes flicking up from her phone with that sharp, assessing glance that made my skin crawl.
“Early bird, huh?” she said, voice smooth but edged with something that sounded distinctly predatory. “Burning the candle at both ends?”
I forced a smile that probably looked more like a grimace. “Yeah, just trying to stay ahead. You know how it is.”
Her laugh was soft but cold enough to freeze hell over. “Funny how some people always manage to be one step ahead… and others just get left behind.”
The words hit like carefully aimed arrows. Each one loaded with meaning, designed to make me squirm.
My heart did this weird skippy thing, but I kept my expression neutral because I’m apparently a masochist who enjoys psychological warfare at 7 AM.
“I’m not worried about that,” I said, which was basically the biggest lie I’d told since pretending Leo’s mysterious jacket situation was totally normal.
Her smile sharpened, and it definitely didn’t reach her eyes. “You should be.”
There it was. The barely veiled threat hanging in the air like toxic smoke.
I nodded carefully, not trusting my mouth to form words that wouldn’t confirm whatever suspicions were clearly brewing in her scheming little brain.
Adelyn gathered her things with deliberate slowness, every movement designed to prolong this uncomfortable moment because she’s apparently fluent in psychological torture.
“Have a good day, Jasmine,” she said with fake sweetness that could rot teeth, then left me alone with my spiraling thoughts and caffeine dependency.
Back at my desk, I tried to focus on emails and scheduling, but my brain kept doing laps around Adelyn’s words.
The tension from my encounters with the brothers felt like it was radiating from my skin in visible waves, like I was walking around with a neon sign that screamed “RECENTLY BEING FUCKED BY TRINITY BOSSES.”
A company-wide memo caught my attention as I scrolled through my inbox: Updated Visitor Protocols and Photography Guidelines.
The timing felt about as subtle as a brick to the face. Were they cracking down on security because someone had reported suspicious activity? Was this Adelyn’s doing?
I was still processing the implications when I passed a side conference room and heard a familiar voice through the partially open door.
“…Jasmine Harlow, yes, that’s her full name.” Adelyn’s tone was businesslike, professional. “I think you’ll find the information very interesting.”
My blood turned to actual ice water.
She was talking about me. To someone. About what, exactly? My browser history? My recent financial windfall? My extracurricular activities with the executive team?
I forced myself to keep walking like a normal person who definitely wasn’t having an internal meltdown, but the conversation continued behind me.
Adelyn’s voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper that I couldn’t make out, which was somehow worse than if I’d heard everything.
The confirmation that my paranoia was actually justified hit me like a freight train made of anxiety.
I retreated to the emergency stairwell because concrete walls felt safer than the open office where anyone could be watching, listening, taking notes for Adelyn’s apparent investigation into my life choices.
My phone buzzed. Text from Nora: ‘Your cute puppy is still on your trail. Maybe it’s time to kick it or get a leash?’
Fresh waves of paranoia crashed over me like toxic surf. If Nora had noticed Adelyn’s behavior too, then this situation was worse than I’d thought.
The net was closing, and I had no idea how much she actually knew or what evidence she might’ve gathered.
The thought that she might have photos—of me with the brothers, stolen moments in offices or hallways—made my stomach perform Olympic-level gymnastics.
In this age of smartphones and social media, privacy was basically extinct. One picture could destroy everything I’d worked for, everything I’d built.
That evening, I returned home feeling like I’d been through a psychological blender. I locked the door behind me with extra care, checking it twice because apparently I’m developing OCD tendencies to go with my growing paranoia.
The apartment felt like a refuge, but even here I couldn’t fully relax. Every shadow looked suspicious.
Every sound from the hallway made me tense like I was expecting SWAT teams or corporate investigators or whatever the fuck Adelyn had unleashed.
I sank onto the couch, phone in hand, scrolling through my contacts like they might hold answers to questions I couldn’t even articulate.
I wanted to call someone—Nora, maybe, or one of the brothers—but what would I say?
“Hey, so I think a coworker is investigating my life and I’m slowly losing my shit because I’ve been keeping secrets that could destroy everything, and also I may have developed an addiction to dangerous men who climb through my bedroom window?”
Yeah, that conversation would go well.
Instead, I sat in the gathering darkness, phone clutched in my hands like a lifeline, waiting for something I couldn’t name.
Every notification made my heart race. Every sound from the hallway sent adrenaline shooting through my system like I was mainlining espresso.
I felt like prey being circled by a predator who was taking their sweet time before moving in for the kill. The anticipation was almost worse than whatever was coming.
How long before everything falls apart? How long before the careful balance I’d been maintaining collapses like a house of cards in a hurricane?
The questions spun through my head on repeat, but the answers stayed frustratingly out of reach. All I could do was wait and try not to lose my mind completely in the process.
Easier said than done when your entire life has become a high-stakes game of emotional Jenga.
