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“In a good way?”

“Maybe,” Mark says. Then he nods. “Yeah.”

23

Jessica

When I find myself sitting in Piper Prince’s office again, she doesn’t look shocked to see me.

“Repeat clients keep me in business,” she explains. She smiles as she offers me a cup of coffee, which I accept. I shouldn’t. I’m probably heading straight for a heart attack if I keep drinking like this, but life is short, right?

“I guess that’s good for you,” I offer.

“It is good for me but bad for you. Let’s talk.”

“Did you have a chance to look over the article?”

“Yes.”

“And?”

“And I think you have a couple of options.”

“It’s not true,” I tell her before she can begin.

“What?”

“It’s not true. There’s no way that Toni did any of this.”

“Oh? Is that the way we want to spin this?”

“Yes,” I tell her. “Let me lay out the facts for you. Then you can give me your best advice.”

“Let’s go.”

“Toni and I dated. We broke up. I dated Kendall. We broke up. Kendall dated Mark. Now they have broken up.” I know this because Kendall left me thirty angry voicemails this morning, all of which I deleted. “I purchased Northington Tech because it was a good investment, but because it also put me in a position of power. I did plan to try to destroy Toni. I was angry and hurting, but I’m not now, and I won’t be moving forward with any of that.”

Piper is quiet as she absorbs all of this information.

“There’s no way that Toni coupled up with Kendall. She didn’t know we dated, for one thing, and I don’t think she even knows who her employees are dating, for another. If she did, she would have told me.” It definitely would have come up in conversation. After all, we spent the entire weekend together in bed. Things happen when you’re in bed together.

You talk.

You share your secrets.