Gemotions

The coffee mug slammed onto the oak desk, the impact echoing in the sterile office. A tremor, a purely involuntary spasm of fury, ran through Amelia’s jaw. She’d poured months of her life into this grant proposal, painstakingly crafting each sentence, obsessing over every detail. And now? This…this blatant plagiarism. The document, identical in structure and almost identical in phrasing, lay spread before her on her laptop screen, a digital insult.

Her fingers tightened, nails digging into the soft flesh of her palms. She found herself breathing hard, the air struggling to fill her lungs. The competing proposal was from… *him*. That smug, condescending Dr. Sterling.

She swiveled in her chair, glaring at the framed picture of her research team, a group of dedicated, brilliant minds. They deserved better than this. She would not let Sterling get away with this audacious theft.