Chapter 4

Three days later, I received a call from HR.

They demanded that I return to the office to sign my exit clearance form.

The moment I stepped into the office, I ran right into Lyndsey, whose eyes were bloodshot.

The entire department looked like their souls had been sucked out.

Only Becca sat at her desk, wearing a full face of immaculate makeup, slowly sipping her Starbucks.

Richard walked out of the conference room, dark circles under his eyes.

When he saw me, the muscles in his face twitched.

"Chloe, had enough of your little vacation? 3:00 PM today is the final deadline Arthur Kingsley gave us. You are going to sit down right now and lead the team to finish this data. If you do, I can pretend this resignation never happened."

His tone was entirely dictatorial.

I stood my ground, refusing to budge, and handed him my physical resignation letter.

"Mr. Davis, I am no longer an employee of this company. Please sign this and issue my employment termination certificate."

Richard’s face darkened further. He slammed a heavy legal document onto the reception desk.

"You still have the nerve to ask for termination! The client sent a final legal notice yesterday. If we don’t deliver the complete data and strategy today, they will sue us for five million dollars in damages for suspected data fraud!"

Becca stepped out of her office, looking incredibly apologetic, but her inner thoughts drifted into everyone's ears in perfect sync:

[If Chloe hadn't maliciously cleared the database before she left, Mr. Davis wouldn't be facing a five-million-dollar lawsuit. I hope she takes responsibility for this. Otherwise, the company is really going under this time.]

Hearing this, the exhausted colleagues who were on the verge of collapsing all raised their heads.

Richard took a deep breath, pulling a single sheet of paper from beneath the legal notice and sliding it in front of me.

It was the Personal Indemnity and Liability Agreement he had pressured me to sign three months ago when the project launched.

He glared at me, a sinister glint flashing in his eyes.

"Chloe, Becca already explained everything. You maliciously deleted the core audience database before you left."

"Your signature is on this agreement. You are personally liable for this entire project!"

"Now, I'll give you two choices. Either you get back to work and fix the data right now, or you personally pay the five million dollars in damages."