Chapter 2

Colleagues pretended not to stare when I walked back to Finance. I canceled the chair, recalculated the year-end tax position without the qualifying purchase, and flagged the resulting exposure for Blake's approval.

Then I answered an offer I'd been ignoring for months.

*Is the CFO position still open?*

The recruiter replied: *We'd love to have you. Three times your current salary. Name your start date.*

Denise, our senior payroll specialist, noticed the revised tax figure on my screen.

"Claire, there's an extra quarter of a million on that forecast. Does he know?"

"I tried to explain. He told me to get out."

Denise frowned. "He's completely lost his mind. We can barely cover next month's payroll as it is."

She'd come to ask whether I could approve a small payroll advance. Her husband had been laid off, and their infant needed a specialty formula.

I took the application into Blake's office. Before I could speak, he signed the revised tax documents without reading them.

"And don't buy anything expensive where Tessa can see it," he muttered. "She comes from a difficult background."

He pinched Denise's request between two fingers.

"Another employee begging for favors? You people are parasites."

Eight years ago, after my previous employer let me go while I was a new single mother, he'd advanced half a year's salary so my own mother could have surgery. I had repaid that kindness with eight years of extraordinary work.

Now he couldn't spare Denise two thousand dollars or listen to me explain a legitimate tax issue.

Outside, I told her the advance had been denied.

"But I may have something better than a loan," I added. "Would you consider a different company?"