Page 26 of Due Diligence

“Your what?” Cassie paused with her bag on her arm.

“My binder,” I repeated as I turned to face her. “It’s black, one-inch. Has some spreadsheets in the front. Unlabeled. I had it right here.”

She flipped her hair away from her shoulder as she straightened her spine. “I put it in the data room.”

The fucking data room.

I stopped suddenly, replaying her words in my head. After a few seconds, I knew there was no mistaking what she just said. “You did what?”

“I put it in the data room,” she repeated.

“It’s not data though,” I responded with my eyes focused on her face as my shoulders started to feel heavy. “It has nothing to do with this.”

“It looked like data,” Cassie insisted, frowning. “And I just assumed—”

“You just assumed the only thing I have going on right now is your precious data room? Jesus Christ, Cassie.” I dropped my backpack into my chair, which made it spin. “Are you serious right now?”

“I’m sorry—”

“Do you have any idea what you’ve just done?”

“Obviously not,” she shot back, arms folded. “What’s the big deal?”

“Goddamn it,” I muttered as I breezed past her towards the door to the fishbowl.

She followed me out of the room, hurrying to keep up with me as I made a beeline for my office. “Stop,” she objected, raisingher voice as we went. “You can’t go in there and I can’t take it out of there.”

“Excuse me?” I asked, turning to look at her with one hand on the doorknob. Over her shoulder, my six lingering engineers were watching the scene with interest.

Cassie shook her head. “That’s part of the security of the room. You’re not allowed to go in there anymore, and we’re not allowed to take anything out of there.”

“But you put something in there that shouldn’t be in there.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she was quick to respond. “I can’t let you go in there.”

“That’s my office,” I reminded her. “You’re telling me I can’t walk in there, grab my binder, and walk out?” My voice was so panicked I barely recognized it. But I could feel my pulse thudding in my ears, like the most unforgiving bass line in the history of the world.

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

Unyielding, we glared at each other, wearing matching expressions of indignation. I was holding my teeth together so tightly that my gums felt like they could go numb. I released a breath, exhaling slowly through pursed lips.

“Come on,” I said, speaking softly. I didn’t break my gaze from her eyes—practically pleading for her to cut me a break. “Don’t do this to me right now. Not today.”

“This is my job. If I let you do this, the entire deal could—”

I shook my head. “The deal is going to be fine. It’s just a personal item, Cassie. Just give me a break, for once.”

“Marcus,no.”

It was only then I realized this wasn’t a battle I could win. There was no way in hell she was going to let me break this stupid policy, which meant my binder—the place where I’d been desperately trying to keep my life together—was going to be out of reach for forty-something more days.

“You’re really something,” I told her, still speaking softly so the engineers who continued to watch us couldn’t hear. “You’ve never met a rule that you don’t love to follow, right?”

“Calm down.”

“I’m plenty calm,” I responded, my voice low. “But did you know? Did you know what you were doing when you took my binder?”

She exhaled hard enough to empty her lungs. “I have no idea what’s in your binder.”

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