The second month began with a fragile kind of hope. One Jackie didn't quite trust but couldn't ignore either.
"No suppliers?" she muttered. "Then I pivot."
She launched a pre-order model. Customers paid upfront and she sourced afterward. It was risky, but effective. She got friends and clients to sell her what they didn't need any more for a bargain and sold for a big profit as part of a campaign. And for a while, it worked. Orders came in, cash flow returned. Hope flickered again.
"I'm doing it," she said, pacing her apartment. "This is going to work, and I am going to win." Clueless to how he was tightening the net, she settled into her rhythm. Enough to restore a sliver of confidence. Jackie worked nonstop, sleeping little, eating less, driven by the stubborn refusal to let her father win. Every notification of a new order felt like a small act of defiance. Every confirmation email was proof that she was still standing.
"He doesn't own me," she whispered one evening, staring at her growing list of fulfilled orders. For the first time in weeks, she allowed herself to believe it.
But Robert Sanders was not a man who lost quietly. The shift came subtly at first. A delay here. A shipment held there. At first, Jackie thought it was coincidence—logistical hiccups, bad timing, the natural chaos of running a business under pressure. But as the days passed, a pattern began to emerge. Packages that should have arrived didn't. Payments that should have cleared stalled. Suppliers who had initially agreed to work with her suddenly stopped responding. By week six, the cracks were impossible to ignore.
Jackie sat at her desk one afternoon, refreshing her email over and over, her stomach tightening with each passing minute. In week six. An email arrived.
Subject: Inventory Hold Notice.
Her shipments were delayed. Reaching out to overseas suppliers was now a dud. Her heart dropped.
"This can't be happening."
She held her head in her hands feeling a headache coming on.
The following week, a collaboration deal with some artists fell through at the last minute. No explanation. By the eighth week, everything collapsed. Refund requests flooded in due to orders she couldn't fulfil. She reached out to her customers, buying time with carefully worded messages, offering updates, reassuring them that delays were temporary. Most were patient. Some were not. Her reputation started slipping. Clients were starting to lose faith in her business. Trust was breaking and Jackie sat at her desk, staring at the screen feeling helpless. Her father's fingerprints were all over it. Every solution she found, he had erased. Every step she took forward, he seemed to drag her back further. She was sitting at her desk trying to figure out her next step when her phone rang bringing with it the final blow. It was her landlord.
"This is Jackie."
"Jacqueline," he said, voice firm. "We need to discuss your rent."
Her chest tightened.
"I know I'm behind, but I can fix it-"
"It's not just that," he interrupted. "Your last payment didn't clear."
Her stomach dropped.
"I've also received notice of financial instability tied to your name."
Her vision blurred.
"Please," she whispered. "Just give me time."
"…I'll give you three days."
"Thank you."
"If payment isn't made," he continued, "I'll proceed with eviction." Eviction.
The line went dead and the word echoed. It sounded final in the silence that followed. Jackie stood there. Still. Feeling empty. She slowly walked to her bedroom, collapsed onto the bed and stared at the ceiling. Two months. Two months of fighting of adapting, of refusing to break.
"I tried," she whispered, "This is survival." Even if it felt like surrender.
Her voice cracked as silent tears leaked down to her pillow. She was exhausted. Her father hadn't just beaten her; he had dismantled her, carefully and completely. Her phone lay beside her. Heavy. Her chest tightened. Slowly, she picked up her phone and typed. Her finger hovered over the send button as she closed her eyes. She let out a shaky breath and pressed send.
Across the city, Daniel Lombard barely noticed the time. His office was quiet except for the soft hum of the city beyond the glass walls. Files were spread across his desk, numbers and projections filling his screen. But his focus wasn't entirely on the merger he had been negotiating for weeks. Something about it felt off. Not the numbers. The timing. Deals that should have progressed smoothly had stalled. Partners hesitated where they shouldn't. Small disruptions, insignificant on their own, had begun forming a pattern. Daniel leaned back in his chair, his fingers steepled beneath his chin.
"Someone's interfering," he murmured. He didn't know who yet. But he knew intent when he saw it. And whoever it was, they were patient and calculated.