Gemotions

"Unbelievable," Clara muttered, the word a small, lost sound in the vast silence of her study. She'd just finished reading the report: her beloved author, Julian Thorne, had lifted entire scenes from her unpublished novel, "Whispers of the Coast." She couldn't breathe.

She reread the side-by-side comparison, her eyes tracing the lines, each word a betrayal. Her stomach twisted; a cold sweat broke out across her forehead. The man who had shaped her worldview, whose books she had reread countless times, was nothing more than a fraud. She was almost unable to move.

She felt a desperate need to scream, to lash out. The anger, the shock, the profound sense of loss, threatened to overwhelm her. She slammed her fist on the desk. The sharp crack echoed in the room, and she gasped. The room felt smaller now, the walls closing in, suffocating her.