Chapter 7 - The Viral Retaliation
Twenty-four hours later, I was back in my Pacific Palisades office, surrounded by the blueprints of our new twenty-story mixed-use development in downtown Culver City.
The quiet was interrupted by my marketing and public relations director, Chloe Perez, who burst into my corner office without knocking. Her face was pale, and she was clutching an iPad that was chiming incessantly with notifications.
"Sloane," Chloe said breathlessly. "We have a major digital situation."
I didn't look up from the structural elevation I was reviewing with a red pencil. "Let me guess. Hailey found a phone."
"Not just a phone," Chloe said, setting the iPad down on my desk. "She’s live on TikTok and Instagram. She posted a six-part video series four hours ago from a cheap motel room in North Las Vegas. It already has five point eight million views. The hashtag *#JusticeForHailey* is currently trending number four in the United States."
I pulled the tablet toward me.
On the screen was Hailey. She was a masterclass in calculated victimhood.
Her makeup was scrubbed clean, her eyes were artificially swollen and red, and she had angled her phone light to emphasize the bruised yellow contusion along her collarbone. She was wrapped in a cheap hotel bedsheet, weeping softly into the lens.
*"I never wanted to speak publicly about this,"* Hailey’s breathy, trembling voice poured from the speakers. *"My sister, Sloane Sterling, has always been an icon of corporate success. But behind closed doors, she was an emotional abuser. For four years, I watched her systematically destroy her husband, Trevor—isolating him, withholding basic funds, humiliating him at company dinners. Trevor came to me in tears two weeks ago, begging for help to escape. We fell in love out of mutual survival. We eloped because it was the only way he felt he could break free from her toxic control."*
Hailey paused, dabbing a tissue at her eye before looking directly into the camera with an expression of tragic innocence.
*"When Sloane found out, she snapped. She used her corporate power to have us run off the road by the highway patrol. She had us arrested on fake theft charges. She canceled our medical insurance while I was lying in a hospital with broken bones. And now... she’s evicting our elderly, retired parents from their home just to punish me. I am terrified of what she’s going to do next. If anything happens to me or Trevor, you know who is responsible."*
I scrolled through the comments.
*—"Omg, corporate women are actual sociopaths! #BoycottVanguardDesign"*
*—"Lock that evil sister up! How could you evict your own parents?!"*
*—"She literally tried to kill them on the highway! Someone call the FBI!"*
*—"Vanguard Design’s corporate sponsors need to drop them immediately!"*
I looked up at Chloe. She was wringing her hands nervously.
"Three of our commercial clients for the Culver City project have already called our media hotline," Chloe said, her voice shaking. "The developers are terrified of a boycott. They want to know if we should issue a generic corporate statement expressing 'deep sorrow over private family matters.'"
"A generic statement?" I said, setting the red pencil down with mathematical precision. "A generic statement is an admission of guilt in the court of public opinion, Chloe. When someone shoots at you with a popgun, you don't apologize for the noise. You return fire with a naval battery."
"What do you want to do?"
"Is Marcus Hayes from the Bellagio still coordinating with our office?"
"Yes, their legal team sent over the full evidentiary package an hour ago."
"Good," I said, standing up. "Call a press conference in our corporate lobby for two o'clock this afternoon. Invite every major entertainment outlet, the *Los Angeles Times*, and *Bloomberg West Coast*. Tell them Vanguard Design Holdings will be addressing the social media allegations made by Hailey Montgomery."
"Sloane... are you sure you want to air this out publicly?" Chloe whispered.
May you like
"Hailey wants to be a content creator," I said, a lethal coldness spreading behind my eyes. "It's time she learned the first rule of digital media: once you upload something to the world, you no longer control the narrative."
---
