Chapter 1 - The Trap Within the TrapEmma’s breath hitched in her throat. The ballroom’s ambient noise—the clinking crystal glasses, the nervous murmurs of politicians, the low hum of the string quartet—faded into a suffocating vacuum.
"Sold the information?" Emma repeated, her voice barely louder than a whisper. Her knuckles turned white against the leather of her ledger. "What are you talking about?"
Damian Moretti did not blink. His gaze was a physical weight, pinning her to the swinging kitchen door behind her.
"Paul Mercer didn't just send a junior accountant into a den of wolves by accident," Damian said, his voice smooth and dangerously low. "He gave you the file because he needed a scapegoat. A clean, anonymous pair of hands to pull the trigger on an internal corporate coup. But Mercer didn't bank on you being smart enough to trace the accounts all the way to Moretti Holdings. And he certainly didn't expect you to copy the drive."
Mateo Cruz shifted his weight slightly, his hand drifting dangerously close to his jacket pocket. "Boss, we don't have time for a seminar. If Mercer's other buyer already has the green light, the hit squads are already moving."
Emma’s mind raced through the wreckage of the past three hours. Mercer insisted that she attend alone. He told her not to contact the hotel’s internal accounting.
It wasn't a routine audit. It was an execution assignment. Mercer was using her to strike at Moretti, while simultaneously setting her up to take the fall for corporate espionage—or worse, a murder charge when the money trail went hot.
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"If Mercer sold the info," Emma said, her eyes flashing with a sudden, fierce spike of adrenaline that overrode her terror, "who bought it?"
"The same man who has been trying to usurp my family's logistics chain for the last six months," Damian replied, a cold, predatory edge creeping into his tone. "Victor Vance."
