Chapter 23 #2
Pricey client dinners cloaked as “cultivation.” Car services lumped into “transport.” A hotel booking funneled through a vendor that comes back defunct when I dig deeper.
My gut sinks like a stone. Because fuck-ups don't move like that.
People do.
I save it all. Twice. Three times for good measure, last one stashed in a folder with the most aggressively mundane name I can conjure: Q4_MISC_REVIEW_FINAL_v2.
Only then does the gravity hit. This isn't some low-level pilfering.
This is the sneaky shit. The kind that blows back on people who didn't even realize they were in the blast zone.
August relies on process. Trusts his team to stay in their lanes so he can steer. Probably sleeps like a baby thinking his house is in order.
Meaning if this implodes, his ignorance won't be an excuse. Just an indictment.
I inhale deep and even, try to slow my galloping pulse.
Not yet, I tell myself. Be smart. Be sure.
I skim the staff list. Two CJs. Courtney Jaymes and Cypress Jordan.
One's green enough to get sloppy. The other's been here long enough to bank on being invisible.
I don't confront them. Not immediately. I observe.
I map out dates, hunt rhythms. How the spikes sync with big product launches. How the figures never leap, just stretch. Patient. Methodical. Like watching someone slowly bleed a company dry through a thousand paper cuts.
Eighteen months back. February. Low enough to skate by.
By May, getting gutsier. Splintered just right to seem like an accident.
Ten grand a month. Every month. For nearly two years.
A chuckle slips out. It's not amusement. It's grudging respect.
Someone built this expecting patience. Counting on trust. Assuming everyone with a vested interest would be too busy manning the helm to glance at the deck.
They nearly nailed it.
I secure the data, push back from my desk. My heart rate's elevated but even. The flowers on my desk seem to watch me, their beauty suddenly incongruous with what I've just uncovered.
Harvest time, I think wryly. Grandma's term for when the bill comes due.
I don't ping August. Not yet.
Because seeing it, truly seeing it, I know one thing for certain:
This wasn't a one-and-done cash grab. This was a long game.
And whoever played it was betting that no one would look closely enough, for long enough, to catch wise.
They played themselves.
I shut down the spreadsheet and rub my eyes. The office has thinned out, that late-afternoon lull where people pretend they’re still working while quietly checking flight statuses and dinner plans. The fluorescent lights hum like they always do, relentless and unbothered.
“Hey,” Lori says from the doorway of my cubicle. “You have a second?”
“For you? Always.”
She smiles, easy, familiar. It’s the first time I’ve really looked at her all day. Same sharp bob. Same measured calm. She holds up her laptop.
“I just need to confirm the vendor list for the Halloween rollout,” she says. “I don’t want to step on anyone’s toes.”
“Sure,” I say, already swiveling my chair. “Share your screen.”
She does. We fall into rhythm immediately, the kind that comes from working with someone competent. Scroll. Click. Confirm. I nod along, offering small edits, nothing consequential. Normal. Safe.
“Okay,” she says, pausing. “Last thing. Can you double-check the timing on the exec check-in? I want to make sure I’m not missing anything.”
“Oh Yeah,” I say, and without thinking, I share my screen back.
My calendar fills the monitor.
Clean. Color-coded. Intentionally sparse.
And then I see it.
So does she.
A block sits near the end of the week. No hearts. No emojis. Just a name and a shorthand that makes perfect sense to me.
Too much sense.
Lori leans back in her chair.
There it is.
Not a gasp. Not a sharp inhale.
An eye roll.
Slow. Fond. Almost impressed.
She tilts her head, lips pressing together like she’s filing something away rather than reacting to it.
“Well,” she says lightly. “That’s… efficient.”
Heat crawls up my neck. I reach for the mouse, minimize the window a second too late. There’s no undoing it now.
She glances back at the screen, then at me, her expression softening just enough to remind me I’m still safe.
“We are absolutely not unpacking that here,” she adds. “But I do love your commitment to discretion.”
I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. Half laugh, half wince.
“Lori—”
She holds up a hand, smiling now.
“Later,” she says. “With wine. And fewer witnesses.”
“Later,” I agree.
She clicks back to her screen like nothing happened.
“We’ll circle back,” Lori adds, already closing her laptop. “On the work stuff. And… the other stuff.”
“Sounds good.”
She stands, slinging her bag over her shoulder.
“Have a good night, Harlee,” she says, warm again. Normal again.
“You too.”
She walks away, unbothered on the surface, leaving me staring at my blank monitor, pulse ticking just a little faster than before.
Careful, I think. We were being so careful.
And somehow, that still wasn’t enough.