Chapter 3: Whisper Campaigns
Leah
She quickens her pace, eyes locked on Wendy’s Manolos cutting a path across the courtyard. The turquoise water glitters beside them.
Don’t do it. Don’t push her. But it would be so easy. One tap, just one, and she’d topple in. Splash! A voice slices through the fantasy—
“Wendy!”
They both turn. Boots lounges by the pool, all Missoni shimmer. Her Le Labo perfume drifts forward, proof that last night always lingers. She lifts her Loewe shades just enough to flash her eyes.
“Come out tonight,” she beckons. “Private thing in the Hills. DJ flying in from Singapore. Men worth ruining your mascara for.”
Leah glances over, catching Wendy mid-calculation behind tinted sunglasses. “Sure,” she says. “I’ll be there.”
“Good,” Boots declares, already reclining, eyes back on her romance novel.
“That’s exciting,” Leah offers, hustling again as they head for the gate.
“Is it?” Wendy doesn’t bother to look at her. Just walks straight ahead.
“I mean, kinda. Boots isn’t just a party girl.” Leah hears the edge in her own voice, aware she’s veering into know-it-all territory. “She’s a gatekeeper. Not just anyone gets on her list.”
Wendy unlocks her BMW with a chirp, then glances back. “Maybe you should come. Be my little notetaker.”
Leah swallows it. Doesn’t take the bait.
“Don’t be late,” Wendy tosses over her shoulder, already sliding into the driver’s seat. The car door slams.
Leah watches her take off down the slope. Humiliation is temporary, she tells herself. There’s always another room. Another game.
But by midmorning, she’s standing at the back of the conference room with the other assistants, overlooked and doing her best to stay that way.
“Quick update on Julia Marr,” Wendy announces from the head of the table. “The true-crime podcaster. She’s this close to signing. Huge win for us.”
“Hold up, Wendy.”
Now Leah pays attention.
“I did some digging,” Felicia Mercer says, tapping two manicured fingers against the lacquered table. “Reddit has a lot of opinions, which I was able to corroborate with a few off-the-record convos. If I knew then what I know now? I’d never have backed this.”
For half a second, Wendy has nothing. Then she finds her footing. “I’m aware she’s polarizing, Felicia. But controversy drives engagement—”
“There’s controversy,” Felicia fires back, “and then there’s liability.”
“Calculated risk is—”
“There are good risks and bad. Marr’s bad, Wendy. Fabricated sources. Exploited victims. Ethics out the window. Drop it before it stains everyone.”
Something gives in Wendy. Barely, but Leah sees it. Come on. Challenge her. Make the mistake.
Then Wendy lifts her chin. “You’re right, Felicia. It seemed worth exploring. Of course, we’ll reassess. My assistant, Leah, brought her in.”
Twelve sets of eyes land on Leah like she’s a roach on the rug, and she understands instantly. Wendy didn’t just dodge the bullet. She turned the gun on Leah and smiled as she pulled the trigger.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
“Leah. Now.”
She follows Wendy out of the conference room, hurrying to catch up. “I know that didn’t go well—”
“Didn’t go well?” Wendy barely tosses her a glance. Just keeps walking. “It was a disaster. Do you have any idea how stupid I looked?”
“It wasn’t that bad—”
“Spare me, Leah. You made me look like a fool.”
For a moment, she nearly says it: I’m sorry. Then she remembers Daddy. Mom. The one thing they always agreed on. Never apologize.
“You signed off on her, Wendy. I flagged the risks.”
“Flagged the risks? You minimized the risks!”
“Not true,” Leah says, not as calmly as she thinks. “You ignored them because you were chasing a win. You only pinned her on me once it backfired.”
Wendy stops. Turns.
“Let’s go inside.”
Ugh. Here we go.
The office door shuts softly behind them. Wendy rounds on her at once. “You think we’re equals, Leah? Or shall I remind you who you are?”
“Sure, Wendy. Go for it.”
“Don’t you get it? After your last boss and all those disgusting allegations, which you had the gall to defend, because clearly you’re a traitor to all women, HR decided firing you would be too messy. So they dumped you on my desk. Problem solved. And yes, Leah, you’re the problem. Congratulations. You’re damaged goods. No one wants you. Me included.”
Leah stands there a moment. Don’t say sorry, don’t say sorry, don’t say sorry. Too late to take it back anyway.
Wendy just glares at her. “Nothing left to say?”
Leah meets her gaze. Lifts her chin. Then turns and walks out without a word. Across the bullpen. Down the hall. Nearly shoulder-checking Troy Winslow’s assistant, the one she thought she had a crush on until she overheard him admitting he liked Taylor Swift. Then a sharp turn into the break room.
It’s quiet in here. Away from Wendy. Away from everyone. But not the memories.
She’d always known it was only a matter of time before Wendy found out the full story about Derek. It had been over two months since everything came crashing down, since the first allegations surfaced.
The first came from the assistant Leah had replaced two years ago, who’d finally gone public, after enough time and enough therapy, to see it for what it was. What pushed her to speak up was realizing she hadn’t been the only one. Then another came forward. And another. Allegedly, it was no coincidence Derek Landau only hired flat-chested blondes. He’d followed the same pattern with all of them—slowly asserting control, disguising it as mentorship, erasing the line between professional and personal. Daily check-ins that became appraisals. Comments framed as concern—about posture, presence, polish. He’d draw them in with loyalty, then start planting the idea. Never directly. Just comments, suggestions. But always the same message: if they wanted to stay, they’d need, of all things, breast implants.
He hadn’t even slept with them. At least, no one accused him of that. Just of abusing his power to reshape them, to force their bodies into the version of femininity he expected from the women who worked on his desk. And once the implants were done, he didn’t have to issue demands anymore. After that came the tweakments: lip filler, jawline contouring, buccal fat removal, the occasional under‑eye fix. Never orders. Just suggestions. Timed carefully. Always paid for, so refusal felt ungrateful, even disloyal.
Leah had tried to distance herself once he was fired in disgrace, but it was too late. The narrative had already hardened—that she’d stood by him. Not because she defended him, but because she couldn’t corroborate the others’ stories. Because she hadn’t lived them. Derek had treated her with an almost excessive formality, hyperaware of a boundary he never tested. Which made sense, she supposed, given who her relatives were and how she’d ended up there in the first place. Derek hadn’t hired her; she’d been placed on his desk. Which made the shame burn even more.
As much as she hated herself for it, she wondered if something had been wrong with her. Because if nothing was wrong, wouldn’t he have tried? The irony wasn’t lost on her—the madness of feeling defective because her boss hadn’t forced her into surgery. Worse was how people looked at her now: skeptical, guarded, as if her version of events were a cover story, like she was still protecting him. And now Wendy had confirmed her worst fear—that she didn’t truly belong here at all. That she’d survived not by merit or trust, but because she’d been seen as a liability. One not even her sexually coercive boss had wanted to touch.
“Listen, Leah.”
Leah turns, pulled from one humiliation straight back into another. Wendy’s in the doorway.
“I’m sorry it got heated,” she says, venturing a little farther into the room. “But moments like this? They separate the pros from the amateurs. You can let a bad meeting ruin you, or take the lesson and move on.”
For one disorienting second, Leah wonders if Wendy actually regrets it.
“Maybe I was out of line. But so were you. Try to be better, okay? That’s all any of us can do.”
Leah doesn’t respond. Just stares at her. So much for an apology.
“Come to Boots’s party tonight,” Wendy says. “Not to take notes. Just come. It’ll look good, you at my side. And hey… we both learned something today.”
“We both did?” Leah asks.
Wendy holds her gaze a moment too long. “Sorry, no, we didn’t. You did.”
The smile disappears.
“Be grateful for it.”