She Didn’t Fix Her Reputation. She Threw It Away. Chapter 06

She Didn’t Fix Her Reputation. She Threw It Away. Chapter 06

He tapped the table twice with his index finger.

“Give me the authorization. We can move against the Blake Group immediately. Within three months, I can have them ruined on Wall Street.”

I shook my head.

Revenge?

That would mean chaining myself to those two for the rest of my life.

Lawsuits, media cycles, ripping the wound open again and again.

I didn’t want to ever hear their names again.

“I don’t want revenge,” I said. “I just want to disappear. As quickly as possible.”

I met his gaze.

“I don’t want to be Daphne Wells for one more second. Just getting away is enough.”

Ghost watched me for a long moment.

The anger in his eyes slowly cooled, replaced by a quiet understanding.

“Alright,” he said.

He opened the laptop again, pulling up a new screen.

“Then who do you want to be? Where do you want to go?”

“Claire Novak,” I said, my voice clear and certain. “I’m going to Reed College in Portland, Oregon.”

It was a fiercely independent liberal arts college.

More importantly, it was on the West Coast, three thousand miles from New York and the suffocating power circles of the East.

There, the Wells name would mean nothing.

“I was accepted last year,” I added. “On my own merits.”

I had turned it down.

For my engagement to Beckett. To stay in New York. For the family alliance everyone had prized so highly.

Looking back, it was laughable.

I had carefully placed myself on the map of his future.

He, in turn, had treated me like a piece of glass he could shatter for sport.

Ghost asked no more questions.

His fingers flew across the keyboard.

“I’ll create a complete backstory for Claire Novak—new Social Security number, all necessary documentation. No one will be able to trace her to Daphne Wells.”

He paused, his eyes flicking to a corner of the screen as if processing another stream of information.

After a moment, he looked up.

“Miss Wells’s application and acceptance records have been scrubbed from all university systems. Miss Novak’s file has been activated. It will take a few business days to finalize the transition. You can report to your new school as early as next Monday.”

“Thank you,” I said.

As I turned to leave, he stopped me.

“Miss.”

I looked back.

He stood there, his gaze no longer as cold as it had been when we first met.

“When you get there, let this all go,” he said. “Find yourself again.”

He paused, his tone solemn.

“You are not an accessory.”

The words hit me like a physical blow.

Tears I hadn’t known were there pricked my eyes.

The kindness of a stranger, it turned out, could hurt more than the cruelty of a loved one.

I gave him a sharp nod and quickly left the room.

When I pushed open the heavy doors of the club, the bright noon sun of Manhattan hit me full in the face.

I raised a hand to shield my eyes.

The street was loud and alive.

I stood on the curb and took a deep breath, the air thick with the smell of exhaust fumes and hot dog carts.

This time, I told myself.

Daphne, you’re going to live for you.