Chapter 3 - The Boardroom PanicBy 6:00 AM the next morning, the sprawling, glass-walled boardroom of Vivian Enterprises was a warzone. The panoramic views of the Manhattan skyline offered no comfort to the panicked executives assembled around the obsidian table.

Vivian paced the length of the room, her hair pulled back into a severe bun, her silk blouse pristine. She had not slept.

"I want everything you can find on a Lily Rossi!" Vivian barked at her head of security, a ruthless former intelligence officer named Marcus. "Every email, every bank statement, every piece of trash she’s ever thrown away."

"She’s a ghost, Vivian," Marcus replied grimly, sliding a thin manila folder across the table. "She fabricated her entire resume to get the assistant job. The references were routed through untraceable VOIP numbers. But I dug into the Elena Rossi connection. Elena had a daughter. Liliana. After Elena died, the girl went into the foster system, then disappeared off the grid at eighteen. She’s smart. She’s been planning this infiltration for years."

Vivian slammed her manicured hands onto the glass table, the emerald bracelet clattering loudly. "I don't care how smart she is! She is a twenty-four-year-old nobody! She claims she has the Dhaka factory manifests and wire transfers. Are our servers compromised?"

The Chief Technology Officer swallowed hard, sweat beading on his forehead. "We... we found a backdoor in our encrypted financial database. It was installed six months ago. From an internal terminal. Lily’s terminal."

"She has it," Vivian whispered, dropping into her leather chair. The reality of the situation was a crushing weight.

For a decade, Vivian had ruled through fear and absolute control. She had crushed rivals, bought critics, and manipulated the market. But she had never faced an enemy who had nothing to lose. Lily didn't want a payout. She wanted blood.

"We need a counter-narrative," Vivian’s PR director suggested nervously. "If we preemptively announce an internal investigation into our supply chain..."

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"No!" Vivian snapped. "That’s an admission of guilt! We don't bend to blackmailers. We destroy them."

Vivian looked at Marcus, her eyes hardening into shards of ice. "Find the server where she’s keeping the files. I don't care what it costs, and I don't care what laws you have to break. Erase the data. And then... erase her credibility. Frame her for corporate espionage. I want her in federal prison by Friday."