CHAPTER FIVE
1492 Words
CHAPTER FIVE
Theo hesitated, glancing between them.
Amanda stepped forward. “What’s going on?”
Theo’s fingers trembled slightly as he turned the phone screen toward them.
The air shifted.
On screen, a headline blared.
"BREAKING: Secret Past Between Devy Luxe CEO and Velvette House Founder—Wedding Scandal Resurfaces After Live Appearance"
Images. Clips. Hashtags trending.
#WeddingWreck #DamienAndAmanda #VelvetteUnveiled
Amanda stared.
The blood drained from her face.
“What the hell—” Damien muttered.
Theo’s voice dropped. “The media’s running wild. Old photos. New speculations. They're tearing it apart.”
Amanda stumbled slightly, grabbing the table for support.
Theo looked at Damien. “This isn’t just noise. It’s going viral. Right now.”
A knock came at the door.
Marisol.
Damien’s head whipped toward the door.
Amanda’s pulse pounded.
Theo took a step forward. “There’s more. And you’re not going to like it.”
“What is it?” Damien and Amanda said simultaneously.
A hashtag blinked on the screen. #VelvetteScam
Under it, hundreds of comments. Thousands of retweets. Headlines from gossip blogs.
"Velvette House Founder Exposed?"
"Fashion Fraud or Hidden Genius? Who Is Amanda Andrew?"
"Leaked Audio Reveals Ugly Truth Behind Top Fashion Brand"
Amanda's knees nearly buckled.
"No... what is this?" she whispered.
Theo tapped the screen again, opening an audio clip. Amanda’s voice — or something that sounded very much like it — played through the speakers.
"They’re all beneath me. I used Marisol because she looks the part. Let them think she’s the brains behind it. The real power is in being invisible."
Damien’s brows furrowed in disbelief. Amanda’s mouth fell open in horror.
"That’s not me," she gasped. "That’s not — that’s edited. I’ve never said anything like that."
Theo nodded quickly. "I know. It’s clearly fabricated. But it’s spreading like wildfire. And there’s more."
He flipped through a series of posts.
Someone had leaked mock emails — full of misspellings and mismatched fonts — claiming Amanda had blackmailed her way into store partnerships. A fake ex-employee had emerged, telling blogs that Amanda was never the founder, that she had stolen designs from struggling artists.
"This is insane," Damien muttered, stepping forward and grabbing the phone.
"Look at the timestamps," Theo said. "All of this dropped in the span of twenty minutes. This wasn’t spontaneous. It’s a hit. A planned one."
Amanda felt the blood drain from her face. The room spun slightly. Her ears buzzed.
Damien saw her falter and immediately stepped in front of her. "Amanda. Sit down."
She shook her head. "No. No, I need to fix this. I need to..."
She looked around the room like the answer would appear on the walls. Her brand. Her life. Everything she had built with her own hands — being torn apart by lies in real time.
Damien put a steady hand on her shoulder. "Amanda. Breathe."
She slapped it away. "Don’t act like you care now. This wouldn’t be happening if—if I had never agreed to do this damn competition."
"Amanda—"
"No!" she snapped. "I told myself I was over this. Over you. But now I’m not just reliving my worst mistake — I’m watching everything I worked for get ripped apart. And I can’t—"
Her voice broke. She turned away, hands clutching her temples.
Theo stepped forward cautiously. "There’s still time to respond. If we draft a statement now, call the PR team—"
Amanda turned back, tears in her eyes. "And say what? That I’m real? That I’m not a fraud? People believe what they want to believe. The internet doesn’t care about the truth. It just wants blood."
Damien watched her carefully. The fire in her voice. The heart-break. This wasn’t just a media scandal — it was a complete unraveling. He had never seen her like this.
He stepped toward her again, more gently this time. "You’re not alone in this."
She looked at him, broken. "Aren’t I?"
Damien swallowed. For once, the man who always had a plan... had nothing.
Damien turned toward her slowly. "Amanda... say something."
"They know me," she choked out. "They know who I am."
"We can do something," Theo said quickly. “Get ahead of it. PR statements. Discredit the sources. We’ll say it’s speculation. We can—”
“No,” Amanda cut in, barely above a whisper. "It won’t matter. I built Velvette House from scratch, Theo. From silence. From the shadows. I kept myself hidden for a reason. My name wasn’t part of the brand for a reason. And now... it’s all unraveling."
Theo’s lips pressed into a tight line.
Damien stared at her, eyes softening — not with pity, but something deeper. "They won’t ruin what you built. I won’t let them."
Amanda looked up at him, a thousand emotions clashing in her gaze — betrayal, disbelief, fear, and something dangerously close to longing. "You say that like you didn’t already ruin me once."
The air between them thickened.
Damien didn’t flinch. Instead, he stepped closer. "You said I’d regret letting them think you weren’t enough. And I did. Every damn day since you walked away."
Amanda sucked in a breath. His voice was low, controlled, but it carried weight — like the apology he never gave.
"You didn’t chase me," she said softly. "Not even once."
"Because I didn’t think I deserved to," Damien replied. "After that night… I believed you were better off without me. But I watched you from a distance. I saw Velvette House rise like a phoenix. And I knew — that strength, that brilliance — I never deserved to stand beside it."
Amanda turned away, her fingers trembling as she wiped her eyes. "You don’t get to say things like that now. Not when everything is crashing down.”
Theo cleared his throat. "There’s more."
Both heads turned sharply.
Theo hesitated. "A video just dropped. From six years ago. Behind-the-scenes wedding footage. The full clip."
Amanda’s eyes widened. "What do you mean the full clip?"
"The seconds after the kiss. When you walked out. The camera caught Damien pushing Vivian away. It shows he didn’t kiss her. That he was ambushed."
Amanda’s breath caught.
Damien's lips parted, stunned.
"So why is that bad?" Damien asked slowly.
Theo’s jaw tensed. "Because the person who leaked it twisted the caption. They’re saying you left not because of betrayal... but because you already planned to. That you were never serious about the marriage and used the wedding as a publicity stunt for your future brand."
Amanda let out a strangled laugh. "That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard."
"It doesn’t matter," Theo said. "It’s viral. They’re painting you as the villain."
The silence that followed was deafening.
Amanda backed away slowly. Her head was pounding. Her limbs felt numb.
"Mandy—" Damien reached out.
"Don’t!" she hissed, holding out a hand. "Just... don’t."
Her breaths came short and fast. Her knees buckled once. Twice. Then she stumbled.
Damien moved fast. He caught her just before she hit the floor.
"Amanda!"
"Get the car," Damien barked at Theo, his voice shaking.
But before Theo could move, the door flew open.
Nina burst in, clutching her tablet, her face pale. "We have a problem."
Damien turned his head, fury barely hidden. "We know."
"No," Nina said breathlessly. "This is worse. Much worse."
But her eyes landed on Amanda — unconscious in Damien’s arms — and the color drained from her face.
The tablet slipped from her fingers.
And the room descended into chaos.
“Amanda!” Nina screamed.
“What the hell happened here?”
“She collapsed,” Damien said, kneeling beside Amanda, holding her hand tighter than he’d ever dared to hold anything in years.
“Someone get the paramedics,” Nina barked.
Theo returned with water, kneeling beside Damien. “The stress was too much.”
Amanda stirred slightly. Her lashes fluttered. “My brand… don’t let them kill it…”
Damien’s throat worked, but no words came.
Nina knelt beside him. “She’s dehydrated. Probably hasn’t eaten. We need to get her out of here before this becomes its own headline.”
As if on cue, camera flashes flickered through the hallway glass.
“They found us,” Theo muttered.
Marisol stood. “Back route. The staff elevator. I’ll guide them.”
Damien nodded. “Theo, bring the car around. Nina, you come with us.”
“I never left,” she said firmly.
Together, they lifted Amanda and hurried through the back corridors.
But just before the elevator doors closed, Amanda whispered something — barely audible.
Damien leaned in. “What did you say?”
Her eyes cracked open.
“Don’t let them
ruin me.”
He held her hand tighter. “I won’t.”
The doors shut.
And in the quiet hum of that elevator, something shifted.
Not just a scandal. Not just a second chance.
But something dangerously close to love.
- Writer
