Except something was wrong with it. People were moving between desks with purpose. The printer ran without stopping. Someone stood at the window on the phone.

I looked around for another moment before it registered.

This energy only happened for one reason.

I turned to my computer and looked at the date in the corner of the screen.

July 2nd.

I leaned forward. Read it again.

July 2nd.

Two months before the wedding. Two months before I died while Ronan and Vivienne watched without a care.

I picked my water bottle up from the floor and set it on the desk. Straightened my glasses.

And then the dread hit me like a wall.

Because I knew this day.

The quarterly partnership review. The one where every department head presented directly to Lucian Vale in front of the entire senior floor. The one where I had to stand up and present my report.

The report.

In my dream - in what I had been desperately insisting was just a dream - I had printed my report that morning and the numbers had been wrong.

Three months of careful analysis turned into something that looked like I had never once opened a spreadsheet in my life.

I had walked into that meeting anyway because I hadn't caught it in time.

And Lucian Vale had told me - in front of everyone, in that flat tone of his - that this was not the standard he expected. That carelessness was not something he tolerated. That I had wasted the room's time.

I had stood there and taken every word of it.

And then Vivienne had found me afterwards, her arm warm around my shoulders. He's like that with everyone. Your work is brilliant, Isla. He just can't see it.

And I had felt grateful.

My hands were already moving. Opening files. Navigating to the report folder.

Please. Please let the file be fine.

I opened the report.

The numbers stared back at me.

Jumbled. Wrong. Column four bleeding into column five. Three months of careful work broken so thoroughly it looked like I hadn't checked it once.

I knew every number in this report. I had built it from scratch. I knew what it was supposed to say and I knew what it said now and I had not done this.

I checked the timestamp.

Last modified: yesterday, 11:47pm.

I had left the office at six.

I stared at those numbers for a long moment.

Was it Vivienne?

The thought arrived quietly. And with it came a hundred horrible memories of my life that Vivienne was apparently always there for.

I pushed it down. Not now.

I looked at the clock.

One hour and forty minutes before the meeting.

Fix it. Just fix it.

I couldn't fix it.

I knew that by twelve forty and kept trying anyway. The corruption was too thorough. Too careful. The kind of careful that didn't happen by accident.

At one fifteen I stopped.

My hands were shaking. I pressed them flat on the desk until they stopped.

I printed what I had. Gathered my materials. Fixed my ponytail. Pushed my glasses up.

You've already survived this once, I told myself.

The thought was not as comforting as I had hoped.

The executive conference room was everything I remembered and had been hoping to misremember.

Floor to ceiling glass. The long table that seated twenty. Every senior staff member already seated.

Vivienne was third from the front. Perfect posture, short dark hair tucked behind one ear, completely at ease. She caught my eye and gave me a small warm smile.

I smiled back reluctantly.

I found my seat at the back - alone, the way I always ended up.

Then the door opened.

Lucian Vale walked in.

He was the heir to the Vale fortune and the whole country knew his face - rich, famous, and the kind of handsome that felt almost unfair. He was also the most demanding, exacting, cold person I had ever had the misfortune of reporting to.

It had always felt personal. The extra work he piled on me. The detailed criticism of everything I submitted. Even when I eventually quit - pushed out by Ronan's expectations - I had been quietly relieved to leave him behind.

He set his folder on the table. Sat. Looked around the room once with eyes that missed nothing.

"Begin," he said.

Four people presented before me.

I heard none of it.

I sat with my broken report in my lap and mentally recited his words from my first life.

This is not the standard I expect.

Carelessness has consequences.

I suggest you take the weekend to reconsider your approach to detail.

I knew every word. Every pause. The way he would look at the report without looking at me - like my presence in the room was secondary to the offense of the work itself.

"Isla Montclair."

My name. His voice.

I stood up. My legs were steady. I was genuinely impressed by my legs.

"The Q3 partnership analysis," I started.

And then I looked at my report and my mind went completely blank.

I had sat at my desk for an hour telling myself I knew this work. I knew every number. The report was wrong but I wasn't wrong.

But Lucian was looking at me and that look had a weight to it I had never once successfully prepared for.

Say something.

"The figures in section three," I said. Too small. Too uncertain. "There was a file issue. Some of the numbers-"

"Present the report please," he said. Patient in the way of someone giving you one more chance.

I presented it.

It was not good. The numbers wrong, my explanations rushed and breathless, three months of solid work invisible beneath the disaster of corrupted figures.

When I finished the silence lasted four seconds.

I counted them.

"The Q3 figures," Lucian said. "Column four."

"There was a file corruption-"

"I'm looking at column four." He never raised his voice. He didn't need to. "Walk me through the figures."

I gave him the correct numbers from memory. The methodology. My voice a bit steadier now.

He listened and made a note.

"The presentation of this report," he said, "is not the standard I expect."

There it was.

"I understand," I said. The same words I said last time.

"Carelessness-"

"It wasn't carelessness, Sir."

The room went very still.

I had not said that in my first life.

Lucian looked at me. His brows knitted together in thoughts.

"The file was modified at 11:47pm yesterday," I said.

My voice wasn't entirely steady but it was present and it was mine. "I left the office at six. I noticed the corruption this morning and did not have sufficient time to correct it before this meeting."

Silence.

"Who has access to your files," he said.

My brows lifted at the question.

In my first life he had said take the weekend to reconsider your approach. He had not asked who had access to my files. He had simply concluded and moved on and left me standing in shame and embarrassment.

He wasn't saying those things now.

"The shared drive," I said carefully. "Standard department access."

He held my gaze for a moment that lasted longer than was strictly professional. Making me a bit skimpy...he was such an uncomfortable man.

Then he made a note.

"Sit down Montclair. We'll discuss the full report separately."

I sat down.

My hands were shaking under the table. I pressed them flat against my thighs and stared at my folder and breathed.

He had not said carelessness has consequences.

He had asked who had access to my files.

And sitting there in that room, with my broken report in my lap and Vivienne's warm smile still fresh in my memory - I was starting to understand exactly what that meant.

I have been reborn.

Chapter 2 Reborn

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