Page 115 of Forty, Flirty & Framed

Despite all the bullshit over the last twenty-four hours, I find myself smiling at their tag-team wisdom.“How in the world did you two get so philosophical?"

"When you get old, you get two choices," Seamus replies."Become wise or become bitter.We chose wisely."

My phone buzzes with another notification.Susanna has texted a screenshot from Twitter:

The real scandal isn't @KarinaPeters' resume—it's a system where qualified people need to lie to get past gatekeepers.#BeyondYourLabel

"You see?"Mom peers over my shoulder."People understand."

As the sun fills the kitchen with golden morning light, I feel something shift inside me.

Not resolution, exactly, but possibility.

The same resourcefulness that pushed me to fabricate credentials could perhaps be channeled differently.

"I think," I say slowly, "I might need to tell my story.The real one.All of it."

Mom beams at me."Yes.Truth is always way forward."

"Not always," Seamus interjects with a wink."Sometimes an innocent white lie is the way forward.Like when your mother asks if her dolma is the best I've ever tasted."

Mom gasps in outrage and swats him with her dishtowel again.

I laugh, the sound rusty…but real.

The pain of Callum's rejection is still raw, the professional reckoning still looming, but for the first time since the party, I feel something like hope.

My phone buzzes once more—a text from Viktoria.

Luke Sterling called.Said Callum's avoiding everyone.Fiona's on the warpath.You okay?

I hesitate, then type a response:

ME:Not okay yet.But I will be.Working on a plan.

Somehow, surrounded by the imperfect perfection of my mother's kitchen, the comforting scent of dolma in the oven…and the unexpected wisdom of an Irish doctor and an Armenian matriarch, I believe it might actually be true.

26

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR SCOT

CALLUM

Forty-eight hours after the engagement party catastrophe, I've barricaded myself in Abernathy Corp's executive office with one singular task in mind.

To bury myself in acquisition paperwork until the outside world ceases to exist.

August is ending with a spectacular heatwave, pushing Seattle temperatures into the nineties, but inside my climate-controlled fortress, I'm immune to both the weather and the emotional aftermath of Saturday night's debacle.

Or so I keep telling myself.

My phone has been silenced, my email filtered to show only MacTavish acquisition-related messages, and my office door locked with strict instructions to Alana that I'm not to be disturbed for anything short of the building catching fire.

Even then, I'd prefer she just email me about the evacuation procedures.

This plan works brilliantly until precisely 2:17 PM, when Connor and Luke simply override my security protocols and let themselves in.

"That's illegal," I say without looking up from my spreadsheets."Corporate espionage, if we're being technical."