Adira's POV
The ballroom at The Dorchester shimmered with chandeliers and money. Tonight's investor gala wasn't just another networking event it was survival. My survival.
Ashley was already here. I could feel her presence before I saw her. The photographers flashed endlessly as she stepped onto the red carpet in a gown designed to make headlines. She thrived in this world of cameras and whispers.
But this was my world too now. And I wasn't here to play.
"Ready?" Jayden's voice was low beside me, calm as ever.
I nodded, adjusting my emerald-green dress. "More than ready."
Kendrick smirked from my other side, whiskey glass in hand. "Let her put on a show. We're here for the money. And trust me, investors care more about returns than red lipstick."
I wanted to snap at him, but he wasn't wrong.
The first hour was brutal. Ashley worked the room like a queen, dripping charm and false promises. I overheard her pitching my own investors, twisting numbers, promising glamorous partnerships that would never materialize.
I clenched my jaw but then Jayden stepped in.
Smooth, commanding, deliberate. He didn't boast, he didn't charm. He educated. He spoke with numbers, with case studies, with future projections. Investors leaned in, captivated.
Then Kendrick moved, cutting through the crowd like a knife. He was bold where Jayden was quiet, disarming where Jayden was calculated. He cracked jokes, charmed in his own arrogant way — and somehow made finance sound sexy.
Together, they were fire and ice. Opposites. But both fighting on my side.
And suddenly, the tide began to turn.
Halfway through the night, Ashley made her move.
She waited until the main presentation, when I stood at the podium, charts glowing on the giant screen behind me. I was confident, steady — until a sharp flicker cut through the projector.
The slides glitched. Then a video played.
A heavily edited reel of me, taken from social media clips, blog headlines, and God knows what else painted me as reckless, spoiled, incapable. Ashley's voiceover filled the room, dripping with fake concern.
"She's not a leader. She's a liability."
Gasps echoed through the hall. My pulse crashed.
Ashley sat at the front table, smiling like a cat with cream.
I froze just for a second then Jayden's voice sliced through the air.
"Interesting edit." He stepped forward, unshaken. "But let's compare fiction with facts, shall we?"
And in one swift move, Kendrick pulled up the backup deck he'd insisted on preparing clean, powerful, irrefutable. The numbers filled the screen again, drowning Ashley's smear in hard evidence.
The investors shifted. Murmurs changed. Eyes went from Ashley... back to me.
I straightened, lifted my chin, and finished my speech. My voice didn't shake.
When I stepped down from the stage, Jayden's hand brushed mine just for a second, steadying, grounding.
"You didn't break," he whispered.
No. I didn't.
And that was the first time I realized Ashley hadn't just declared war. She'd underestimated me.
Ashley's POV
She stormed out of the ballroom before the applause could finish. Rage curled inside her chest.
Adira should've crumbled. She'd set it up perfectly. But Jayden and Kendrick... they'd saved her.
Fine. If she couldn't destroy Adira's empire with investors, she'd destroy her personally.
And this time, no one not Jayden, not Kendrick would stop her.