Jamie wiped her eyes, then her entire face lit up. “I did. In the lounge. After the storm. I was showing Denise the footageand went to the bathroom. I left it on the couch for maybe five minutes.”
The room got very quiet.
Dex said it before I could think it. “It had to have been Denise.”
“No.” I shook my head. “That doesn’t track.”
“It tracks perfectly.” Dex’s voice was calm but insistent. “Jamie shows Denise the footage. Denise sees Jamie punch in her code to the phone and memorizes it. Jamie leaves the room. Five minutes is more than enough time to open a browser, post the video, and close the tab. Jamie comes back, phone’s exactly where she left it. Nothing looks touched.”
“Denise is Rose’s business partner. Her best friend, basically. Why would she want a video of Rose going viral?”
“Because it’s literally her job?” Dex said it like it was obvious. “She’s Rose’s admin person. She drives bookings. She runs the socials. And she strikes me as the type who’d bend a few rules if she thought the end result justified it. Maybe when she saw that footage on Jamie’s phone she thought: jackpot. Free publicity. Millions of eyeballs on the ranch overnight.”
I looked at Jamie, who was watching the exchange with red-rimmed eyes and desperate hope, the expression of someone who might not get fired after all.
“Or maybe Jamie’s right and the account got hacked,” I said. “Channels our size get targeted constantly. Could’ve been a fan who got hold of login credentials. Could’ve been a hundred things that don’t involve Rose’s best friend committing a crime in her own living room.”
Dex gave me a look. “You really think some random hacker grabbed one specific unreleased video off Jamie’s phone and posted it with a clickbait caption?”
When he put it like that, it sounded thin. But so did the alternative.
“I think accusing the person Rose depends on most, based on a bathroom break and a theory, would do more damage than the video already has.”
“Fine.” Dex held up both hands. “Then who did it?”
Silence.
I looked back at Jamie. She looked wrecked. Eyes swollen, shoulders hunched, the posture of someone bracing for the axe to fall.
“I was going to fire you,” I said honestly.
Jamie’s breath hitched.
“But I’m not going to. Not yet.” Our eyes met. “Not until I’ve talked to Rose and figured out what actually happened. If it turns out you’re lying to me?—”
“I’m not,” she whispered.
“Then you have nothing to worry about.” I moved toward the door, then stopped. “No more recording. No more posting. Nothing. Dex handles everything from this point forward. And Jamie?”
She looked up.
“Keep this conversation between us. Don’t tell anyone. Especially not Denise.”
She nodded quickly.
Dex followed me into the hallway.
“You know it’s most likely Denise,” he said, low enough that Jamie couldn’t hear.
“Maybe. But like I said, I’m not going to accuse Rose’s closest friend based on a browser log and a theory.”
Dex studied me for a beat, then shifted gears. “By the way. Just got off the phone with Red Bull. They want to extend the contract. Subscribers are up half a million since last night. PR’s lighting up. They want a statement, a follow-up video, the whole playbook.”
Half a million new subscribers. Because a private moment with Rose got turned into content without her consent.
“No.”
“I told them you might say that.” He pulled up something on his phone, showed me a graph with a spike so steep it looked like a cliff face. “From a pure numbers standpoint? This is the best thing that’s happened to the channel in years.”
