POV: Sophie Mitchell
Henry Morris's office is on the thirty-ninth floor.
Sophie scheduled the meeting through his assistant without explaining why. She just said it was important and personal. She didn't mention that she knows his secret.
The CFO looks startled when she walks in. He's a man in his mid-forties with expensive hair and tired eyes. The kind of tired that comes from knowing you're doing something wrong and doing it anyway.
"Sophie," he says. He stands up but doesn't offer his hand. "I wasn't expecting to see you again."
"Since James and I were married," Sophie says, "I would think you'd remember me well. You helped organize the whole thing."
Henry sits back down slowly. He's trying to figure out what she's here for.
Sophie sits without being invited.
"You've been stealing from Ashford Holdings," she says. She keeps her voice level. Not accusing. Just stating facts.
Henry's entire body goes rigid.
"I don't know what you're talking about," he says, but his voice shakes.
"You've been receiving one hundred fifty thousand dollars every month for the last fourteen months," Sophie continues. "The payments come from different shell companies but they all lead to the same place. Someone is paying you to do something to this company. And whatever you're doing, it's working. The company is falling apart."
Henry stands up and walks to the window. His office overlooks the city but not as much of it as James's office does. Everything about Henry's life is slightly less than what he could have had.
"If you're here to blackmail me," Henry finally says, "you should know that I have insurance. I have records."
"I'm not here to blackmail you," Sophie says. "I'm here to ask you why."
Henry doesn't turn around. He just stares out at the city like it has answers.
"Why?" he repeats. The word comes out bitter. "You want to know why I've been sabotaging the company I've worked for for twenty years?"
Sophie waits. She's learned that silence makes people confess things they weren't planning to say.
"I built this company as much as James did," Henry finally says. His voice is quiet but there's rage underneath it. "I stabilized it during the market crash. I made decisions that saved it when it was falling apart. But I'll never be CEO because I don't have the right last name. I'll never sit on the forty-first floor. I'll never have the respect that James has just because he was born into it."
He turns around and looks at Sophie directly.
"James inherited power," Henry continues. "He didn't earn it. He didn't fight for it. He just got it because his father died and left it to him. Meanwhile I've been here for twenty years watching him waste what he has. Watching him make safe decisions. Watching him run this company on routine and legacy instead of vision."
Sophie understands this anger. She's felt versions of it herself.
"So you're destroying him," she says.
"I'm exposing him," Henry corrects. "There's a difference. I'm showing everyone that James Ashford isn't fit to run his own company. I'm proving that he's broken. That he can't handle what he inherited."
Sophie leans back in her chair.
"And what happens after you expose him?" she asks. "What do you think comes next?"
Henry doesn't answer.
"Someone else takes over," Sophie says. "Someone who wants your job just like you want James's. Someone who won't value your contributions any more than James did. You'll be right back where you started. Except this time you'll be the man who betrayed his company."
Henry's face hardens.
"Who sent you?" he asks suddenly. "Derek Sterling?"
Sophie's silence is answer enough.
"I knew it," Henry says. He sounds almost relieved. "I knew he'd figure it out eventually. I've been waiting for this."
"Derek Sterling doesn't know I'm here," Sophie says quietly. "And if he finds out, he'll know that you've been discovered. He'll cut you loose. You'll be left with nothing and no one."
Henry sits back down at his desk. For the first time, he looks afraid.
"What do you want?" he asks.
Sophie takes a breath.
"I want you to tell me exactly what you're doing. I want you to tell me how many people you're working with. I want you to tell me everything Derek Sterling asked you to do. And then I want you to help me take over Ashford Holdings instead of him."
Henry's head comes up. He looks at Sophie like she's just proposed something impossible.
"If I do that," he says slowly, "Derek Sterling will destroy me. He doesn't forgive betrayal."
"I know," Sophie says.
"And James will eventually know what I did. He'll know I was sabotaging him. He'll hate me for it."
"Probably," Sophie agrees.
Henry stands up and walks to his desk. He pulls out a drawer and hands Sophie a folder. Inside are documents. Bank statements. Communications. Everything that proves what he's been doing.
"If I do this," Henry says, "if I help you instead of Derek, I want something in return."
Sophie waits.
"I want to be part of building something real," Henry finally says. "I don't want to just survive anymore. I don't want to be the man who stole money or sabotaged a company. I want to be the man who helped save one. I want redemption."
Sophie takes the folder.
"You help me build Ashford Holdings into something greater than it is," she says. "You work with me to fix what you broke. And maybe, eventually, James will understand that you were trying to wake him up, not destroy him."
Henry extends his hand.
Sophie shakes it.
And in that moment, everything changes.
Sophie is no longer just someone studying a company from the outside. She's now someone with access to the inside. She's someone with Henry Morris's guilt as fuel and his knowledge as a weapon.
She's someone who understands exactly how to tear down an empire because she now knows exactly where all the cracks are.
As Sophie walks out of Henry's office, her phone buzzes.
It's Derek Sterling.
How's your research going? We're getting close to shareholders meeting. I can feel it. This is going to be beautiful.
Sophie stares at the message and realizes something that makes her hands go cold.
Derek doesn't know that Sophie has made contact with Henry.
Derek doesn't know that Henry has confessed everything.
Derek thinks he's still in control.
But Sophie now has an insider who knows exactly what Derek's plan is and how to stop it.
Which means Sophie is playing a game with three players and everyone thinks only two exist.
And she's not sure anymore if that makes her brilliant or if it makes her exactly what Derek wanted her to be.
A weapon.
Just pointed at someone different than he thought.