Page 75 of Knot in the Wedding Cards

I check the timestamp twice, because the first time my brain refuses it.

"They want confirmation at Town Hall within twenty-four hours of issue," I say. My voice comes out flat and even, which is how I know it's bad. "Or every designation-sensitive service I run is suspended pending full investigation." I turn the page over. Nothing softens on the back. "They gave me one business day to reorganize my entire life."

Sawyer's answer is quiet.

"Less. The clock started at issue, not delivery."

I find the issue time.

9:17 this morning.

The envelope reached my desk at seven-forty tomorrow's problem, delivered before the sender's own deadline had finished being generous. I have until 9:17 tomorrow. My apricot cuts sharp through the neutralizer for half a second — bruised, citrus-bright, the smell of something I keep behind a locked door getting its hand on the knob.

I breathe it back down.

Twenty-four hours is not oversight. Twenty-four hours is a hunting technique.

Now I have to wonder who wants the end of my business?

Priya joins on video within minutes, reading glasses on, already grim. Sawyer moves to stand at my shoulder while shereads the legal spine of the thing aloud. He doesn't touch me, but suddenly his presence delivers an odd sense of support. Like a true pillar waiting for me to lean upon if need be.

He’s just being professional…

You think if I repeat it in my head enough, it’ll become true?

Niall shuts the office door.

I send four words to the group chat —office, now, bring lawyers— and Marlowe and Juniper come through the back within the quarter hour, because those two really don’t play around with me and the business I created from scratch.

"There are exit ramps," Priya says. "On paper. None of them fit through a twenty-four-hour door." She lists them fast, so I hear the wall behind each one. Register a pack-based support household — takes weeks. Produce a designated emergency officer already under an employment contract — I don't have one. Surrender the Omega- and pack-specific services outright — that's half my company and the entire structure holding up Sloane and Nolan's wedding. Submit to provisional oversight — which means handing the government my medical files, my staff's designation records, my scent protocols, and my clients' private event plans.

"Or," Priya finishes, "you declare a temporary support unit and buy time while the review runs."

"Then we declare the unit."

"Amber." Priya takes her glasses off, which is her tell, the thing she does before a true sentence. "Read the classification they've filed you under. The support unit has to contain at least four registered adult members. Not counting you."

The number sits on the desk between all of us.

Four.

Not three.

I had a plan I hadn't admitted to yet —a shameful, folded-away plan where, if it came to my knees, Beckett and Augustand Cade could at least be a number.Three signatures. Three bodies that already have a professional reason to stand near me.

I built a whole quiet contingency out of the men who wrecked me, and the government just looked at it and called it insufficient.

"Why four?" Juniper's already furious. "Who needs four?"

"Because they've put her in the highest-risk operational category." Priya reads it in the department's own voice, which is worse. "Event scale. Volume of mixed-designation guests. An allegation that the applicant experiences unstable scent events while working." A pause. "Five years, Amber. Not one documented incident in five years. They built the risk profile out of an accusation and then charged you for the height of it."

My hand is already in the desk drawer, reaching for the neutralizer spray, before I decide to.

Marlowe takes it out of my hand.

"You're allowed to smell angry in your own office," she says with a huff.

"Anger isn't the problem."