Chapter 4
Chapter Four
Diana
I draw in a breath as I put the finishing touches on my correspondence to the mountaintop-project client.
Do I press Send?
I’ve already typed it up, and I’m ready to print out a hard copy to send certified snail mail as confirmation.
This will be the end of my position here at Lund & Lopez.
But not the end of my architecture career.
I’ll do what I perhaps should have done in the first place. Set up my own architecture firm.
I’m new, yes. But I’m good.
I don’t need the hefty salary L & L are paying me, and I’m in a unique position. I have the means to stand up for what’s right.
I feel for Marcus. He needs his job because he has a family to support.
Oh God…
Will I be putting Marcus in jeopardy?
I need to talk to someone before I do anything. I leave the carefully typed email in my drafts folder and grab my purse. It’s after lunchtime anyway, though I’m not hungry.
I walk out into the lobby, wave to the receptionist, and tell her I’ll be back in an hour.
It’s a brisk autumn day in Denver, so I choose not to leave the building. I descend in the elevator to the ornate lobby on the first floor, find an empty chair, and make my call.
“Hello, sweetheart.”
My father’s voice. So calm and clear and full of strength. My father, Talon Steel, has been through hell in his life—a lot of which I didn’t know about until recently.
“Hi, Daddy,” I say on a sigh.
“Everything okay, Diana?”
“I’m fine.”
“How’s the investigator working out for Dragon?” Dad asks.
“Honestly, I’m not exactly sure. He won’t tell me everything.” I purse my lips. “But that’s not why I called.”
“Why did you call, sweetheart?”
“I need to talk to you, Daddy.”
“Of course.” I hear him typing. “I’m supposed to get on a phone conference in about ten minutes, but I’ll delay it.”
“Crap. I don’t want you to neglect your own work because of mine.”
“This has to do with your work?” he says. “Isn’t this just your second day?”
“Yeah.”
“All right, Dee. What’s going on?”
“I don’t want you to miss your call.”
He chuckles. “Screw my call. When one of my kids needs me, that’s where I’ll be. Always. You know that.”
I scratch my arm. “I should be able to handle this myself.”
“You’re a capable young woman, Diana. And I have every faith in you that you can handle anything yourself. But sometimes getting some advice from someone who’s older—and may I say it, wiser—is never a bad thing.”
I draw in a deep breath. “Okay, Daddy. Here goes. You know that big mountaintop resort project I told you about?”
“Yeah. It sounds great. I know you’re excited about it.”
“I was. Still am, really, but I found a problem in the plans.”
“Does that mean they put you on the project?”
“No, not exactly. Yesterday, my first day, my boss had me look over some of the firm’s projects. The mountaintop project was included. But I found an issue on the blueprint.”
“What kind of issue?”
“It has to do with the irrigation and plumbing system. One of the pipelines is a little too close to a cliff. I won’t go into detail, but suffice it to say it could cause major problems.”
“And you brought it to their attention?”
“They already know, Daddy. And they should. Any architect worth their salt would’ve pointed it out. The problem is?—”
“Don’t tell me. The problem is fixing it will cost a lot of money.”
“Yeah. In the millions.” I sigh. “So they’re not looking to fix it.”
“Is there a chance the issue won’t end up being problematic?”
“Well, sure. There’s always a chance. And things can go wrong with buildings all the time. Even things that aren’t foreseen. But the point is that this can be fixed. Yeah, it’ll cost money. And of course one of my coworkers gave me the big spiel about how money doesn’t mean anything to me because I have a lot of it.”
Dad sighs into my ear.
I rub at my forehead. “The mountaintop project is the reason I took this job. I’d be thrilled to work on it. But I honestly never thought that these architects—some of the best in the country—would resort to such tactics.”
“You’d be surprised what people do when money is involved,” Dad says, his tone dark.
Don’t I know it. My father was put through the most horrible abuse, the greatest possible trauma someone can inflict on a child, all for money.
And I thought it was the right move to call him and whine about corporate America cutting corners after what he’s been through. There’s no comparison. He probably thinks I’m being pathetic.
I take a deep breath.
No. Of course he doesn’t think that. My father loves me. He loves all of us. And he’s proud as hell of what I’ve accomplished.
Problems don’t have to be as monumentally horrific as what he’s been through to still qualify as problems.
“But Daddy, you don’t let money get in the way of doing the right thing,” I say.
He chuckles again. “I’m guessing I probably have way more money than any of these architects. Or than the business itself. But that’s not even the point. Your uncles and I don’t cut corners for one specific reason.”
“What’s that?”
“The biggest reason is, like you said, because we do what’s right. It’s what we were taught. But number two is that when we found out our father wasn’t the esteemed pillar of society we always thought he was, and that he did questionable things in the name of money, your mother, aunts, uncles, and I decided not to run the business that way. That’s easy for us to say, of course. Our holdings are worth a small fortune.”
“I know you don’t do business like that, Dad. It’s one of the reasons I respect you so much. And the reason I wanted to call you.”
“You’re wondering what to do.”
“Yeah, I am. I feel like the right thing here would be to let the client know about the issue. But if I do that, I’ll almost surely lose my job.”
“Would that be such a bad thing?”
“Maybe not for me. I might be blacklisted among architecture firms in Denver, but I might not be. That’s not really the issue. The issue is my coworkers. One of them, Marcus, has a baby on the way. He needs his job. If I alert the client to this potential issue, they might fire the firm.”
“And you’re afraid that may cost your friend his job.”
“I don’t know if it would or not. I have no idea. I haven’t seen the financials for the company. I do know this is their biggest project, and I’m sure they’re relying on the payoff.”
“There’s really only one question you need to answer, Diana,” Dad says.
“What’s that?”
“Can you live with yourself if you don’t bring the issue up to the client?”
I don’t reply. Instead I ponder Dad’s words.
I was so excited about this job. About this project, but even if I don’t work on the mountaintop project, the vertical farming project is really cool too.
Dad speaks again.
“Diana, I don’t think you’ll be blacklisted at architecture firms in Denver if you do this.”
“You don’t?”
“No. I think you’ll be respected. Your firm won’t be thrilled about it, and you might lose your job with them. People get fired for much less all the time. But the people who are worth working for will value your commitment to doing what’s right. And if they don’t, you’ll know that you don’t want to work at those places anyway.”
I rub at the knot forming at the back of my neck. “But I have to think about the other people at the firm. Marcus and the other architects on the project. Including my boss, Mr. Reynolds.”
“But he knows about this issue, correct?”
“Yes. According to Marcus, everyone on the project knows.”
“I understand your concern for your coworkers who may be harmed in the fallout. You have to decide, Diana, what is more important. The client or your coworkers.”
“I hardly know anyone yet. I just started this job. But I don’t know the client either.”
“For all you know, the client may already know about this issue and is okay with it.”
“Maybe, but I don’t think that’s the case. Marcus would’ve told me if it was.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“I’m not sure about any of this. That’s why I called you. You always give the best advice.”
“So you want to know what I would do in the situation,” he says.
“Yeah.”
He pauses for a moment. The only indication I have that the call hasn’t gone dead is the light sound of his breathing in my ear.
“I think, Diana, that I would be doing you a disservice if I answered that question.”
I nearly drop my jaw. “Daddy?”
“Sweetheart, I feel for you. I do. But there comes a time in life when you need to make your own decisions. You need to weigh the pros and cons and come up with something that you can live with. That will keep your conscience clear.”
“You’re really not going to tell me what you would do?”
“No, Diana. I’m not. What I will tell you, though, is that at age sixty-two, my conscience is clear.”
“But you don’t think your father’s ever was?”
“I know it wasn’t. Uncle Joe talked to him before he died twenty-five years ago, and he had many regrets.”
“Do you have faith in me to make the right decision here?” I ask.
“If I didn’t, Diana, I wouldn’t put you in this situation.” I can hear a smile in his tone. “It would be very easy for me to tell you what I would do. It would be very easy for me to tell you what you should do. But this is an opportunity for some growth. You’re twenty-six years old, and you can do this. I know you can. I have faith that you’ll make the right decision for everyone involved.”
“I wish I had that much faith, Daddy.”
“It’s time for you to believe in yourself, sweetheart. Your mother and I believe in you. Your aunts and uncles all believe in you. We believe in every one of you kids. I’m always here for you.”
“Thanks. You can go ahead and take your phone call now. I’ll figure this out.”
“If you want to talk through it, I’m here for you. You, your mother, your sister, and your brothers are the most important people in my life. I will always make time for you.”
“It’s okay. I’ll make my decision.”
“I know you’ll make the right one,” he says.
“I will. Bye, Daddy.”
I sit in the chair for a few moments before I rise, shoving my cell phone back in my purse.
I ascend in the elevator, thinking things through.
I know what the right thing to do is.
I just have to weigh it against Marcus and the others. How this all might affect them.
“Oh, good, Diana, you’re back already,” the receptionist says as I walk back into the office.
“Yeah, I wasn’t very hungry,” I say to her.
“Mr. Reynolds is looking for you.”
“Okay. I’ll go check and see what he wants.”
I walk straight to Rod’s office, but he’s not there. “I thought he was looking for me,” I say to his secretary.
“Oh, yeah.” She wrinkles her forehead. “He is. When I see him, I’ll let him know you’re back.”
“Thanks.”
I walk back to my cubicle, and I drop my jaw.
Rod is sitting at my desk, my computer screen open.
“Care to explain this, Diana?”