Everyone let out a small laugh after hearing what Aaron asked, and this time, the laughter wasn’t aimed at him—it was at Jamie. They weren’t laughing because the situation was funny. They were laughing because Aaron didn’t even know who she was. No one did. Yet here she was, inserting herself boldly into a conflict as if she had any real stake in it, did she think she was the main character or something?
Jamie’s chest tightened with frustration. The whispers, the sideways glances, the amused chuckles—it all made her feel small. Invisible. She squeezed her hands into fists at her sides, digging her nails into her palms. This wasn’t how she imagined it. She hadn’t walked into the room to be ridiculed. She had come to make a statement—to tear apart Raina’s carefully crafted image and expose
