บททั้งหมดของ Bound by Contract, Freed by Love: บทที่ 31 - บทที่ 40

Elena's POVI slept badly the night before. My mind kept running through answers. Percival had given me a list of likely questions and a tone to use: plain, short, and steady. James from PR had lined up the press Q&A as a controlled exercise. They called it staged, but I knew the reporters would be ready to pounce if I slipped.I arrived early. The room smelled of coffee and microphones. Grant Hale sat at the head of the panel with his notes. He greeted me with a quick nod. Percival stayed close and gave me a tiny checklist—one line per page.“You ready?” he asked in a quiet voice.“As ready as I’ll ever be,” I said. I kept my hands loose in my lap.Grant tapped his pen. “Ms. Hart, we’ll begin with the clinic. Then we’ll take a few questions on the investigation. We will be direct.”“That’s fine,” I said.He started with something easy. “Tell us, in one sentence, why you blew the whistle.”I looked at him and then at the cameras. I kept my voice slow. “I heard the numbers and they did

Elena's POVI was in the small conference room with a stack of old donor files when I saw it. The inspector had left a box of archival material for me to sort. I was going through the pages because Corbin wanted a timeline of donations around the accident year. It felt like busywork until a folded letter slipped out and landed on my lap.I opened it with fingers that did not quite trust themselves. The handwriting was small, careful, the kind of script someone uses when they are trying to be polite and hidden at once. It began, "To the board of trustees…research relief allocation approved." The date at the top made me tilt my head.The year was the same year Dominic’s parents had died.I read the paragraph twice. It mentioned a donation to "research relief" that week. It named a correspondent bank and an instruction: route through Atlantic Trust, hold until confirmation. The words matched patterns I had seen in the Unit 44 files: trustee routing, Atlantic Trust, courier IDs.My chest

Elena's POVI woke at four and could not sleep again. My bag was packed the night before. Counsel had sent me an itinerary and a short prep sheet. Percival had called at dawn to calm me. I took the call and tried to breathe like he told me.“You’ll do fine,” he said. “Stick to facts. Short answers. Let counsel lead on legal points.”“I know,” I said. I sounded like I was repeating a mantra. “I’ll be careful.”He did not ask if I was scared. He knew the answer. He just said, “Call me when it’s done.” Then he hung up.The plane ride felt small. I read the binder for the hundredth time. It had copies of the Atlantic Trust notes, the trustee routing memos, the clause amendment, and the recent courier testimony. I had highlighted the lines I expected to cite. I had practiced saying the dates out loud. Saying dates calmed me. Facts were a leash.At the hearing the room smelled like old wood and coffee. Counsel walked me through the procedure in one quick whisper before we entered.“Stick to

Elena's POVThe cafe smelled like burnt coffee and warm pastry. I sat at a corner table because the investigator said the old man preferred a public place. He arrived late, slow on his feet, hat in his hands. He looked smaller than I had expected.“Ms. Hart?” he asked, voice thin.“Yes,” I said. I smiled to put him at ease. “Thank you for coming.”He nodded and sat. He unfolded his hands and looked at the table like it held a map he feared to read.“Can I get you coffee?” I asked.“No, thank you,” he said. “I don’t drink much these days.”I pulled out my phone and showed it to him. “I need to record this,” I said. “Legally. Corbin and counsel will need a verbatim take. I will not publish anything without your consent.”He blinked. He seemed relieved. “You’ll keep my name out of it?” he asked.“Yes,” I said. “If you want anonymity, we will protect you. We can arrange witness protection if needed. But first I need to hear what you remember.”He breathed out a puff. “It was a long time a

Elena's POVI woke up to a text from Percival: subpœna at nine. Be ready. He used the old legal shorthand and the small black square of his name made my stomach tighten.I had rehearsed the night before. I had run questions with Percival, with Ms. Alvarez, and with Dominic. We kept the answers short and the facts tight.“Stick to dates,” Percival told me over coffee. “Say file names. Say times. Don’t tell stories.”“Short answers?” I asked.“Short answers,” he said. “If they press motive, say why you reported in one line: patient care and procurement integrity.”Ms. Alvarez added, “If they go personal, we object and we pivot. You do not have to answer personal questions that are not relevant to the chain of evidence.”Dominic sat across from me and held my hand for a second. He did not offer advice. He did not need to. His palm was steady and warm.“You ready?” he asked.“As ready as I can be,” I said. My voice sounded small in the kitchen.He smiled, the way he tried to make me belie