Credit Where It Isn’t Due

Jean Dubois stopped Ayla under a gilt archway where the ballroom noise broke into little bursts around them.

“Explain,” he said, smiling at the couple passing behind him as if this were all routine. “Why did I learn you were married to Matteo Cipriani in front of my entire donor board?”

Ayla kept her back straight. She let her hands hang at her sides. The gallery off the ballroom was quieter, all marble and framed oil portraits, with the city lights of Midtown laid out beyond the windows. She could still hear glasses clinking in the room they’d left.

“You didn’t ask,” she said.

Jean’s mouth tightened. He smoothed the front of his tuxedo jacket with two fingers. “Don’t play games with me. You’ve been working under my name for three years.”

“No,” Ayla said. “I’ve been working under Dubois Global’s name. There’s a difference.”

He glanced toward the ballroom, checking who might be listening, then leaned in just enough to make the threat plain. “Do you know how many opportunities I put your way? Donors asked for you. Sponsorships came in because of my introductions. You hid this from me.”

Ayla looked at him, flat and steady. “You took the first three project proposals I wrote and presented them as your own ideas. You put your initials on the Beaumont gala schedule. You told the Laurent Foundation I was your assistant when I was the one building the floor plan.”

Jean gave a short laugh that had no humor in it. “Those are internal details. You have no idea how this business works.”

“I know exactly how it works,” she said. “You claim credit. You smile at the board. You leave the people doing the work out of the room.”

The color in his face shifted. Not anger yet. Calculation. He lowered his voice. “You married a billionaire and thought I wouldn’t care? That man could have bought this company twice over.”

“He’s my husband,” she said.

That got through. His eyes flicked to the ballroom again, then back to her. He looked smaller in that light.

“I invested in you,” he said.

“You invested in yourself.”

She stepped around him before he could answer. He caught her wrist once, not hard, just enough to stall her.

Ayla turned back. Jean let go at once.

“You’re done taking my work,” she said. “And you’re done calling it mentoring.”

She walked toward the ballroom doors without looking behind her. Jean stayed rooted in the gallery, staring after her, his face gone thin and pale.

Mabel Laurent caught up to them by the glass doors, her diamond bracelet clicking against her wrist. “Ayla, wait. The comment about the dress—it was a misunderstanding. I didn’t know who you were.”

Ayla stopped on the granite step, her shoulder resting against Matteo’s arm. “You knew I was the coordinator who worked fourteen hours to set your seating chart, Mabel. That was enough.” She didn’t wait for a response before stepping into the back of the car.