CHAPTER 79

I sat there, stunned, my hands cold and trembling under the table. The room’s oppressive silence felt like it was squeezing the air out of my lungs. Charles had pulled the rug out from under me, and the board was already convinced.

What seemed to come to be even worse was that, Thiago, the man I thought I could count on, had hesitated to believe me. His silence was louder than the accusations being thrown my way.

“I agree,” one of the board members, Mrs. Lavoie, said after what felt like an eternity. “It’s in the best interest of the Bermudez Group to suspend Bridgette while we investigate this fully.”

The others nodded in agreement, their faces unreadable, though I could feel the judgment radiating from them.

Suspension? My heart dropped even further.

They were stripping me of my authority of being their CEO, right before my very eyes. Not officially firing me—not yet—but this was a public shaming. It was like being exiled from my own territory, a place I’d already bled so much for