Chapter 3

At 2 PM the next afternoon, I arrived at Walden Industries' meeting room. The company's lawyer sat on one side of the long table with a third-party notary and three media representatives.

Coco sat on the other side of the table, pale and dry-lipped. She looked like someone who had been suffering for a long time.

The livestream already had 500,000 viewers the moment it started, and the comments section was scrolling up quickly.

The company lawyer spoke up first. "Miss Coco Wilson, please share your request with us."

Coco's voice trembled softly. "I'd like to request that Walden Industries rescind Sandra Luther's job offer and hold her responsible for stealing my portfolio."

She took out her first set of evidence from a document bag. "These are all the medical records I've accumulated during my university days for my sessions at the psychiatry department to treat my depression. I have made a total of 12 visits for my condition."

The lawyer took the medical records from Coco and handed them to the notary officer.

"This second set of evidence contains the design drafts of my university days. Every draft has my signature on it."

Coco placed the stack of design drafts onto the table. "The third set of evidence is screenshots of texts between Sandra Luther and me, where you can see how she has been insulting me and threatening me for a long period of time."

The lawyer turned to me. "Miss Sandra Luther, do you have anything to say about the evidence against you?"

I replied calmly, "All of this evidence could have been forged."

All the livestream viewers laughed.

[Go on and make up your stories.]

[Look at how the rich are trying to wash away their guilt.]

The lawyer knocked on the table. "Silence. Miss Coco Wilson, please present the core evidence that you mentioned."

Coco pulled out a printed document from the very bottom of the document bag. "This is a cloud document with its log history. The timestamp of their creation matches the portfolio Sandra Luther submitted for the job application."

She pushed the logs to the middle of the table. "I am the original author."

I stared at the logs and saw that they were created three years ago. I had used the cloud document to create my portfolio, but my account ID was registered overseas.

The lawyer turned the logs toward me. "Miss Sandra Luther, how do you explain the fact that Miss Wilson is the documents' original creator?"

"My account ID was registered overseas and has no link to the local version."

"Do you have any evidence to prove that?"

"I can show you my login right now."

With that, I turned on my laptop to log in to my overseas cloud account, but the page failed to load, and connection timed out. This created an uproar in the comments section.

[I bet she did that on purpose.]

[She must be feeling guilty.]

[How convenient that there's a technical issue.]

Coco lowered her head, her shoulders trembling slightly as if she were trying her best not to cry. "Why do you still insist on denying what you did, Sandra?"

My mother was watching the hearing from the public gallery. She suddenly stood up. "My daughter is not that kind of person!"

The lawyer looked at my mother. "Those seated in the public gallery, please remain silent."

My mother was asked by the staff to return to her seat.

That was when Coco's cousin, Rita Wilson, spoke up. "Miss Luther, please explain the records of your bullying at university for four years."

"There is nothing to explain because none of it happened."

"Then please present your evidence for that."

My knuckles turned white as I gripped the mouse.

Coco looked up at me with tears in her eyes. "All I want is an apology, Sandra. Why won't you give it to me?"

The comments section started scrolling up swiftly. [Apologize! Apologize! Apologize!]

I felt my throat dry up as I stared at the comments. That was when the lawyer closed the file and said, "There will be a ten-minute break for this public hearing. We have some technical issues to resolve."

I stood up and walked to the window. My phone buzzed. It was a text from an unknown number. [Your mother's statement won't help you. We'll be connecting with two classmates online later.]

I turned back to look at Coco. Her head was lowered as she spoke to Rita, and a small smile appeared on her face before she quickly wiped it off.