Chapter 35 Unassigned
Eli’s POV
The conference room at Ward felt smaller than it ever had when I walked in knowing I was the one under the microscope.
Lucas sat at the head of the table, face pinched, sleeves rolled, that look he got when he was trying to be both brother and boss and knew he was about to fail one of those jobs. To his right was Daniels from compliance with a folder thick enough to be a legal weapon. Beside him sat the external consultant, ex Bureau, eyes flat and weighing.
They had the screen already cued.
Dock photo. Me and Sloane on the cabin dock, pixels unkind but unmistakable. Stage footage from the all hands, me taking an attacker down as her hand steadied my shoulder. A grainy street cam still of my hand on hers in the SUV after the brake attempt. A waveform representation of the leaked audio that made my skin crawl just seeing it. Berlin was a ghost even in these walls.
Daniels used phrases like appearance of impropriety and conflict of interest while he clicked through slides. The external guy talked about liability if I missed a cue because I was too close, what a jury would see if something happened to her and they played these clips back.
None of them mentioned what it felt like to watch someone you were supposed to protect hear her own pleasure on loop in a room full of strangers. They did not care about that part. Only what it did to the brand.
Lucas did not look at the screen. He watched me instead, jaw tight, eyes tired. He already knew every frame. He had probably stayed up half the night watching them with a bottle and a calculator, counting how many clients we might lose if we handled this wrong.
When they finally stopped presenting my sins in high definition, Daniels folded his hands. “For the sake of the firm’s obligations and insurance,” he said, “we have to respond. The conclusion is that Mr Ward should be removed as lead on the Mercer account. We recommend assigning a different senior operator as primary point of contact.”
Removed. The word landed heavier than I expected. I had spent years being the one put on cases when things were already on fire. Now they were telling me I had become lighter fluid.
Lucas cleared his throat. “We cannot just pull him entirely,” he said. “Mercer hired us because of Eli. She trusts him. There is an ongoing high level threat. I propose we assign Jace as lead of record, to satisfy governance, with Eli remaining as a strategic consultant. Off site analysis, briefings, high level advice. No more visible proximity than necessary.”
It was a compromise only someone with my last name would fight for. It still felt like a demotion and a betrayal of the mission I had built my life around. Everything in me that had sworn after Amira that I would never again stand behind a client while someone else took point screamed.
“You understand what this means,” Daniels said to me. “No more primary engagement. No more travel without explicit approval. And absolutely no non professional conduct with the client for the duration of the contract.”
As if that directive was not a bar I had already failed to clear. As if forgetting Berlin now would magically make the past untrue.
“I understand,” I said. The words tasted like ash.
Lucas caught my eye, something like apology flickering there. He was trying to keep me in the room any way he could. It was better than total removal. It did not feel like enough.
Telling Sloane was worse.
She was in her office, spine straight, hands flat on her desk, when I closed the door. One look at my face and her mouth hardened.
“They are taking you off,” she said. Not a question.
“Officially,” I said. “On paper, Jace is lead now.”
Her eyes flashed. “They do not get to choose who guards me.”
“They think they do,” I said. “Liability. Optics. Words they like more than listening to the person actually in the crosshairs.”
She pushed to her feet so fast the chair rolled back and hit the credenza. “My vendors are dictating my safety arrangements,” she said, voice low and furious. “That is not governance. That is a coup with paperwork.”
I stepped closer, careful not to reach for her, every part of me wanting to close that last inch. “On paper Jace is lead. In reality, I am not walking away. I will be where you need me. Even if that means working in the shadows of my own firm.”
Something brittle in her eyes cracked at that. Guilt seeped through the anger, softening the line of her mouth. “Your career is paying for this,” she said. “You built Ward with rules and now they are using those rules to cut you out.”
“My career was always going to bleed for something,” I said. “Better it be for something I chose.”
The silence between us hummed. She looked like she wanted to say more, then the moment shuttered. The CEO slid back over the woman.
We met Jace together in a smaller briefing room. He was everything Ward liked to show clients. Tall, clean cut, charming. Ex intelligence, smooth as glass.
“Maam,” he said to Sloane with an easy smile. “Honor to work with you.”
Her shoulders went up a fraction at the word. She hated maam, especially from men who thought it sounded respectful while it put her in a box she did not fit. I watched the tiny twitch in her jaw and filed it away.
I walked him through the updated protocols, what we had learned, who was on the inside of the circle. He listened, asked smart questions, nodded in the right places. Did not overstep. Yet.
Watching him mentally stand where I had stood burned more than I expected. Every time he said we instead of you, my jaw ticked. Sloane noticed, of course. Her gaze flicked between us with something like defiance, like she was daring the world to try and replace me and think she would not notice.
When the day was finally over and the building had gone quiet, I sat on the edge of my bed in my apartment and stared at my phone. For the first time in a long time, there was no ping from her side needing an immediate response. Jace was in her hallway. I was not.
I thought of her shaking in the SUV after the brake job. Of her hand on my shoulder backstage. Of the way she had looked when she said she would lose the only thing that was hers if Mercer fell, and the way her eyes had flashed when I told her that was not true anymore.
The text came just after midnight. Unknown number.
Stepping back is wise, soldier. People close to her tend to get erased.
There was no link, no image. Just the words. A quiet promise. A reminder.
I stared at the screen until it dimmed. My reflection looked back, tired and hard edged. Whoever it was, they had not just been watching her.
They had been watching me too.
And they were very sure that if they could not push me off the account from inside, they could scare me back from the edges.
They had not learned me very well at all.