The press room smelled of floor wax and something sour underneath — old coffee, maybe, or the sweat of people who had stood at this lectern before her.
Arianne set her papers down. The microphones were live. She could hear her own breathing in the foldback, a sound the cameras would not catch.
Gray suit. Not black. Black was for funerals. She had stood in her closet that morning and thought about the difference.
Gio stood at her right. Franz stood against the back wall. She had told him the back, and he had gone there without asking. She wanted the cameras to see her alone at the lectern. Whatever they printed today, the image would be hers.
She began.
"Good morning."
Two words, steady. She had learned the trick at sixteen: speak the first line as if you have already won, and the rest follows.
"I am filing two cases today. Both are about the lies printed about me last week."
She named them. Kieran Voss. Maren Voss. The names meant nothing yet. They would by noon.
