Page 123 of Due Diligence

“Cassandra—”

“I mean it. I know I’m going to get fired before the end of the day and I know he’s going to lose everything. I wish that all didn’t have to happen. But was it worth it?” I nodded softly. “I spent my whole life being told I was one thing, when deep down I was so much more complex than what was on the surface. Obviously, I’m still trying to figure that out. But I think that was why I was good at this job. I’m good at figuring out what’s below the surface because I’ve always just wanted someone—anyone—to see I was more than that.”

“And he saw that?”

A nod. Again, that was a gross understatement. Marcus didn’t just see me; he loved me. Even though he had never said it, I knew that he did. I felt it in my deepest center—the place where logic and reason couldn’t reach. “He was the first person to ever do that for me, Corinne.”

Something in her eyes told me my words resonated with her. I didn’t know how and I wouldn’t ask. But I could see it—maybe she had someone like that. Or maybe she was that person for someone else. I didn’t know. But I could tell that in her silence, she understood it.

“You were good at this job,” Corinne agreed after a moment. “But you were wasted there. I’ve always felt that way.”

“Really?”

Corinne nodded again. “Look, this chapter in your life is going to close, and it’s not going to end well. That’s okay. Take it as an opportunity—find something to do that you really care about, not just something you do because you can.” She raised both shoulders. “Pick out something thatmattersto you. It’s so worth it.”

I was about to respond when my phone began to ring in my hand, lighting up with the name of a woman whose timing was always impeccable.Mom.

“Take that,” Corinne said as she eyed my vibrating phone “I have to get moving on…god, I don’t even know. But go ahead.”

I answered the call as I was walking out of Corinne’s office and heading to the elevator. I didn’t say anything at first. I just let her say my name a couple of times before I finally said, “Hi, mom.”

She was quiet on the other end. I hadn’t called her mom in years.

“Where are you?”

“At work,” I responded. “Well, for now. I probably won’t be here tomorrow.”

I stepped into the elevator and saw my reflection in the mirrors that lined the car. I saw weary eyes and heavy cheeks. My stomach knotted. I was right back where I started six years ago.

“Why not?”

“I’m about to get fired from my job.”

I continued to stare at my reflection, watching the way that my mouth delivered such weighty news so nonchalantly. “That’s not me being dramatic. I’ll be fired before the end of the day.”

“What on earth did you do?” The concern in her voice was clear. I wasn’t surprised. My father had been cold, but never my mother.

“I probably can’t speak about that for legal reasons. Again, not being dramatic.”

My mother was quiet before she released a breath against the phone. I could picture her face, staring out the bay window in the living room at the foggy San Francisco morning. When I was a girl, I spent hours staring out that window at the gray fog that surrounded our home. Nothingness. Sweet, quiet nothingness.

“It was because of a guy,” I told her, even though she didn’t ask. I knew she was thinking it.

“Cassandra, not again.”

“It’s nothim. Trevor. I would never give up anything else for him.”

“Who would you give up your career for?”

I paused, reflecting on that question for a few beats. Career. What a concept. That wasn’t how I looked at my job at all. Being a due diligence analyst was meaningless to me. It was a transaction—a means to make money and nothing more. I did it because it paid well, and because Icould.

Corinne’s words were still fresh:Pick out something thatmattersto you.

As far as my career, I had no idea what mattered to me. I had never bothered to look. It had been an endless hunt for prestige, going to schools that others couldn’t and aspiring to positions that only few could be selected for. Never, not once in those conversations, had anyone asked me what mattered to me.

So, I didn’t know. But what I did know was that Marcus mattered to me—maybe more than anything had ever mattered to me.

“I love him,” I told my mom, admitting it to her and to myself. It was the first time I had ever uttered those words about him, and once they were out in the open they blossomed. They blossomed with big red petals and yellow centers and leafy tendrils that soaked up sunlight and spread wide in the warmth of a nurturing world. “I love him so much, I wake up in the morning and I worry I’m going to realize it was all just a dream.”

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