Betrayed and Dumped: She Rose Stronger Than Ever novel Chapter 98

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Bruce glanced at Sonja, and their eyes met with the same look of confidence. They both thought the win was in the bag. Then the host lifted the sheet of paper and called out, “The winning bidder is… Sunforge Tech!”

A stunned silence filled the room. You could have heard a pin drop. Sunforge Tech? No way. That couldn’t be right. The other company reps stared at Bruce and Sonja, completely thrown off. This was nothing like the inside scoop they’d heard.

It wasn’t just them. Even Rebecca, Cindy, and Justin were frozen in shock. Justin was the first to snap out of it, breaking into a huge grin. “Oh my god, Rebecca, we did it!” He started jumping around, barely able to contain himself.

Cindy flung her arms around Rebecca, squealing. “You sly genius. You knew we’d win, didn’t you? No wonder you were so chill.”

Rebecca could only laugh, partly in disbelief. She hadn’t known at all. She was just as surprised as everyone else. But then she remembered when Mr. Nichols showed up halfway through. Suddenly, things clicked.

She took a couple steps forward and lowered her voice. “Thank you for your support, Mr. Nichols.”

She’d thought he kept his distance because he didn’t want to give her false hope. Clearly, she’d been wrong.

Mr. Nichols gave her a warm smile. “You’ve got it backwards. I should be the one thanking you. Your proposal was fantastic. It checked every box we needed, and your price was so competitive it blew the others away. The decision to go with your team was unanimous.”

Rebecca knew he was being modest. Without his influence, things probably wouldn’t have gone so smoothly. She promised, “We’ll keep every commitment we made in the proposal. You can count on us.”

“Good,” Mr. Nichols replied. “Keep up the good work. I’m looking forward to working together on the next phases, too.”

With that, he and his assistant walked out, leaving the room buzzing.

People from every other team except NovaStack Cloud came over to congratulate Rebecca. They shook her hand, offered their well-wishes, and a few even made dinner plans to share ideas. Rebecca stayed calm and polite, as usual. “Thank you. I’d love to catch up.”

It didn’t take long for the crowd to thin. Soon, only the Sunforge Tech and NovaStack Cloud teams remained, lined up on opposite sides of the room.