It’s the first time back at the London office since Malcolm accosted me outside. Pacha has been checking in, threatening to actually murder Malcolm in a way that’s oddly comforting. He envelops me in a bear hug, his Paco Rabanne cologne a familiar ease on my senses.
In an error of judgment, Wyst has misrepresented itself as a company while competing in TechRumble.
We cannot accept third place and will not accept the prize money.
We apologize to Odericco Investments, Dominic Odericco, and all our users.
Cecily scans the rest of the Word doc, cringing.
“You don’t like it?” I ask, sipping my coffee and trying to fight my rising defenses. “It’s just a draft.”
She sucks her teeth. “It’s too corporate. You need something less sterile.”
“But it’s a company statement?” I argue.
“Yes, butthis”—she holds up the paper—“doesn’t reflect the values of the company.”
I purse my lips. “What do you think it should say?”
Her mouth turns into a soft smile. “I think if you want the users to understand what happened, it needs to come from you directly, not ‘Wyst the Company,’ and you need to tell the truth.”
My stomach knots. “The whole truth?”
She nods. “And nothing but.”
I take a long calming breath. “Okay, do you still have your camera?”
Several hours later I’m sitting in bed at Cecily’s house. She’s preloaded me with tissues, ice cream, and Peanut M&M’s to numb the pain.
We uploaded the video to YouTube three hours ago, kept it unlisted, and sent it directly to Dominic with a separate letter stating our withdrawal from TechRumble. A courtesy ahead of the video going live tonight. We have yet to hear back from anyone at Odericco Investments, which is stressing me out more and more by the minute, but Cecily assures me they have seen it as it’s been viewed twenty-six times and only two of those views were us.
The instant we sent the email, I wanted to call Oliver. Toask for insight into Dominic’s reaction, but also for comfort that this was the right decision. But he’s not my boyfriend; we agreed we shouldn’t put a label on things yet. It’s not fair on either of us to put the pressure on right now, to define a relationship in the eye of the storm. Plus, the bad press it could bring to Dominic on top of everything else feels like I’ve stabbed him in the back with multiple different knives.Hey, I made a mockery of your competition, committed fraud, and am falling for your cousin slash personal assistantfeels like too much news to deliver at once. Lying low seems like the right thing to do. Still, I can’t help but miss Oliver’s voice, his smell, his touch.
Cecily and I sit on the bed with gin and tonics in cotton pajamas as we stare at my glowing laptop screen. I fiddle with the scalloped edges of a throw pillow resting between my crossed legs.
“Are you sure you’re ready for this?” she asks, squeezing my leg. “We can postpone the video if you want? Give you a few more days to process?”
“I’d love to.” I sigh, hugging my knees close to my chest. “But Malcolm isn’t exactly giving me a choice. If he wants to take this public, then so be it.” This time I’m fighting fire with fire.
“True, it’s only fair to give him what he wants after you shish kebabed his foot.” She stifles a laugh and I follow suit.
As our laughter subsides, the heavy air returns.
“I might be about to blow everything up.” I cut a glance to her equally solemn face. “We could be out of a job in a few minutes.”
She looks at her watch. “It’s actually going live in forty-eightseconds so maybe less,” she says, having scheduled all the posts to go out on all social media platforms at the same horrendous time.
“Shit, shit, shit.” I close my eyes and rock back and forth, the bed creaking under my weight.
“Ten seconds,” she says as she grips my hand so tight it momentarily distracts from the pain about to come.
I tense for impact, as though I’m about to get blasted out of a rocket into the sun.
“It’s live,” Cecily says, refreshing all her open tabs to confirm. “Everywhere.”
She refreshes the video, automatically causing my voice to ring out of the laptop speakers:
“Hello. My name is Jess Cole and I am the founder of Wyst.
