Chapter 3
By early evening, they found themselves seated again—same floor, different room. A project space had been prepped in advance, clean and quiet. The table was bare aside from their tablets, and the room's glass wall reflected the city in muted lines of dusk.
Lucas arrived two minutes after Emily. She was already at the table, coffee gone now, hands folded around a tablet she hadn't yet opened.
He took the seat across from her. No one spoke. The quiet held steady—not distant, not close. Just mutual.
Then: "The Ferris board wants a full narrative rebuild. Contained, not replaced."
Emily nodded. "I'm assigned to Nora Ferris. Persona prep. They want her forward-facing."
Lucas's tone stayed even. "She's the board's moral center now. They'll need her to hold more than just public sympathy."
"And she didn't ask for that weight," Emily said—not critically, just as fact.
Lucas glanced down at his notes. "That's why it needs to be built carefully. If anyone can shape that foundation, it's you."
Emily's posture softened slightly. "And if the board fractures underneath it?"
"Then I'll make sure it holds."
They didn't smile. But something eased—like shared weight between them.
"If I align the public read around her," she said, "you'll stabilize the backend."
"Exactly. We keep her centered, and everything else orbits cleanly."
Emily tapped her tablet, reading the outline silently. "She's not used to attention. It'll need to feel lived-in."
"Then build from her voice. We adapt the system to fit it—not the other way around."
She glanced at him. That wasn't what she'd expected to hear.
"Alright," she said. "Forty-eight hours?"
"I'll have a legacy draft by then."
Lucas didn't bring the case home. He didn't need to.
The structure of it—timelines, outcomes, public sentiment forecasts—settled into him the way pattern always did. It wasn't obsessive. Just orderly.
He moved through his apartment with quiet efficiency, jacket off, sleeves rolled, the city humming against the windows like distant static. On his second monitor, the Ferris case brief glowed pale against the darkened room.
He stood with a mug cooling in his hand and reviewed the crisis map. Not the people. Not yet. The strategy. The variables. The failure points.
Messaging tiers, escalation paths, public perception models. Nothing manipulative. Nothing sharp. Just structure. The kind people don't notice unless it fails.
He made notes:
• Anchor messaging in continuity.
• Avoid over-saturation.
• Legacy image framing: use conservatively.
He clicked through the board's internal phrasing, trimming excess, tightening intent. It wasn't about polish. It was about pressure resistance. Narrative integrity.
He paused at a photograph. Nora, standing behind her father at a charity gala. He didn't zoom in. He wasn't looking for feeling. He was looking for shape—what the public would see, what might fracture under scrutiny.
The cursor blinked beside a phrase: Ms. Ferris represents the board's moral future.
Lucas adjusted it: Ms. Ferris carries forward the values that shaped the institution's legacy.
Not softer. Not harsher. Just... reinforced.
He logged the change and closed the window.
He wasn't building a mask. He was building a shield. One she could stand behind until the worst passed.
And he told himself that was enough. For now.
The apartment was quiet. Not soft—quiet. Intentional. Structured.
Emily sat cross-legged on the floor in front of her low table, blazer tossed over the back of a nearby chair, sleeves rolled to her elbows. A single lamp cast a circle of light over the documents spread across the tabletop—press briefs, interview transcriptions, internal memos. A digital folder hovered open on her tablet, organized into color-coded tabs. Clean. Contained.
She reached for her glass—water, untouched—then set it down again. No sip. Just movement.
The Nora Ferris briefing wasn't long. It didn't need to be.
• 43, single.
• Public image: controlled.
• Background: mid-level nonprofit work, elevated by circumstance.
• Current position: symbolic heiress of the board's moral legacy.
There were talking points. Templates. Projection models.
Emily had already rewritten three of them—quietly, under breath. Not because they were wrong, exactly. But because they felt… off. Constructed. Flattened.
She tapped through to a video file. Nora at a board event—thanking donors, referencing her late father's work. Voice steady, but eyes flicking down too often. Hands wringing together behind the podium.
A woman caught in a script she didn't write.
Emily paused the footage. Backtracked. Played it again. Slower.
Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, then dropped into stillness.
Her job wasn't to question. Her job was to refine.
But refinement required truth, and something about the file felt like a trick mirror. All the right shapes—none of the weight.
She opened a clean notepad and started jotting loose phrases. Her style. Her voice. Small anchors.
• Doesn't make eye contact when she's reading from prepared statements
• Holds tension in her wrists
• Speaks faster when she's remembering, slower when she's repeating
Emily leaned back against the couch behind her, legs still folded under her. The city hummed behind glass—indifferent, glittering.
She'd handled hundreds of personas. She knew how to map a life onto a narrative.
But this one… didn't want to be mapped.
And the more she read, the more it felt like Nora Ferris didn't want to be saved. Not this way.
Emily's eyes narrowed slightly. She wasn't sure if the knot in her chest was discomfort or instinct. Maybe both.
She kept writing anyway.
The conference suite had been chosen carefully—neutral tones, soft lighting, just enough comfort to feel curated without leaning into warmth. It wasn't a boardroom. It wasn't a lounge. It was a space meant to suggest safety, without promising it.
Emily arrived five minutes early. She always did.
She set her tablet down, smoothed her jacket, and stood with her hands folded loosely at her waist. Not guarded. Not casual. Just... prepared.
The door clicked open at exactly 3:00.
Nora Ferris stepped in alone. She was dressed in muted navy, her hair pulled back too tightly to be elegant. No assistant. No handler. Just a slim folder clutched in both hands like it might float away if she didn't hold it still.
"Miss Verrill," she said quietly, almost apologetic.
"Ms. Ferris. Thank you for meeting with me."
They shook hands. Nora's grip was light but firm. Professional. Practiced.
Emily gestured to the seat across from her. "Please. Wherever you're comfortable."
Nora sat carefully, posture upright, the folder settling on her lap like a barrier. Emily didn't press. She tapped her tablet awake but left it untouched.
"This isn't an interrogation," she said after a moment. "It's a conversation."
"I've been through enough of those lately," Nora murmured.
It wasn't bitter. Just... tired.
Emily nodded once. She could feel the edge of it already: that sense of someone used to being handled, shaped, measured. Nora wore it like a second skin. Not resentment—resignation.
"I've reviewed the board's proposed narratives," Emily said, voice level. "I'd like to hear yours."
That caught Nora's attention.
"Mine?" she echoed. "I don't think anyone's asked me that before."
Emily offered the faintest smile. "Well. I just did."
From there, the conversation began—careful, cautious. Emily didn't pry. Nora didn't volunteer. But in the pauses between questions, in the slight narrowing of eyes, the faint shifts in posture, a shape began to form.
Not of a public figure. But of a woman caught in something she didn't ask to carry.
The conference room felt neutral. Familiar. It should have.
Emily was already seated, stylus in hand, reviewing the latest updates on the shared screen. Lucas entered quietly, tablet tucked under his arm, suit crisp despite the late hour.
He offered a small nod. "Have you had a chance to look at the revised timeline?"
"Just finishing," she replied, eyes still scanning the display. "It's tight, but it works."
Lucas settled into the chair across from her. The room hummed with the soft static of equipment, lights dimmed to late-day settings. For a moment, it felt like any other review.
"I smoothed out the transitions between the public statement and the coverage rollout," Lucas said, swiping to the next slide. "That should give Ferris some space from the board without disrupting the core narrative."
Emily nodded, thoughtful. "I noticed that. It reads... measured."
He glanced at her. "Not too cold?"
"No," she said. "Not cold. Just... planned."
A pause.
Emily tapped her stylus on the margin. "One note—this phrasing here about 'legacy assurance'... I'm not sure it sounds like something Nora would support."
Lucas leaned in, reading the line. "It's language for the board's positioning. Nora's personal messaging will stay separate."
Emily hesitated. "Then maybe the board shouldn't be speaking through her at all."
That earned a glance.
"That's not how this works," he said evenly.
"No," she replied, tone just as level. "But maybe it should be."
A longer silence this time.
Lucas looked back at the screen. "We can't afford to let her tone dilute the structure. The story needs scaffolding."
"She's not scaffolding," Emily said. "She's a person. If we ignore that, it won't hold."
Lucas exhaled softly through his nose. Not disagreement—just pressure. "Then you're trusting the audience to do the work for us."
Emily didn't flinch. "Maybe they should. Maybe that's the only way this doesn't implode."
Neither spoke.
The cursor blinked.
Emily adjusted a line in the margin. Lucas annotated a comment. The movement resumed—professional, practiced.
"I've scheduled a second conversation with Nora. Less formal. Off-site," Emily said, her voice quieter now.
Lucas blinked. "She asked for that?"
"She did."
He nodded once. "Alright. Let me know what comes of it."
"I'll forward the transcript after my session," she replied.