The peace in the town car was just sustained until Clarkson's phone came on, connecting to the cellular network. Then it lost its top.It was not a progression of separate alarms. It was one, ongoing, electronic scream. The phone vibrated itself off the leather seat, a mad, out-of-date insect. Text messages, emails, voice-mail messages, news alerts—these inundated the screen in a continuing, coalescing wave, one by one by one of the fragments of the media grenade that had just detonated.Maya, in the passenger seat in front, was on her phone, speaking in low, rapid-fire damage control. "Yes, I saw the headline… No, we won't be putting out a clarifying statement… The statement was the declaration… I don't care what counsel says, the strategy is altered…"Jonah stiffened on his chair next to Clarkson, watching the phone slip down the seat. The adrenaline of the meeting, the speech, the dazed, screaming approval, was rapidly coalescing into hard, icy fear. He could feel the world beyond
Last Updated : 2025-09-22 Read more