“I’m not asking.”
“Three?”
“No.”
“Two?”
“If needed.”
“The position is remote-first.”
He stared.
“You’re building a remote program and you need someone whose remote request got denied.”
“That is an uncomfortably accurate summary.”
Daniel leaned back.
“Why me?”
“Because you understand operations.”
“Because people trust you.”
“Because your reviews repeatedly say you solve problems without building kingdoms around yourself.”
“And because you left.”
“That qualifies me?”
“It means you understand the cost of failure.”
Daniel looked toward the wall.
Lily’s paintings covered nearly half of it now.
“I don’t want to go back.”
“To Arcturus?”
“To who I was there.”
Evelyn nodded.
“I’m not asking you to.”
“What are you asking?”
“Help me build what should have existed before you needed it.”
Daniel rubbed his hands together.
Through the screen door, Lily dropped something outside.
Then picked it up.
Daniel looked toward the sound automatically.
Evelyn saw.
“I won’t give you a deadline.”
“Good.”
“How long?”
Daniel looked back.
“One week.”
“That is technically a deadline.”
“My deadline.”
“Fair.”
That evening, Daniel found a drawing on the kitchen table.
Birch Road house.
Oak tree.
Creek.
Three people.
One tall.
One small.
One medium-height figure with dark hair.
Daniel stared.
Then sat.
He had not invited Evelyn into their family.
He was not sure he had invited her into his life.
Lily apparently had different administrative procedures.
Daniel folded the drawing and placed it inside a cookbook.
He did not show Evelyn.
Not yet.
Project Lighthouse went before the Arcturus board in August.
Evelyn told Daniel Victor had been lobbying against it.
“Of course.”
“He says operating teams will abuse exceptions.”
“People always think flexibility means no standards.”
“He believes precedent is dangerous.”
Daniel looked at her through the phone.
“Everything becomes precedent if you’re afraid enough.”
Evelyn asked him to attend.
“Why?”
“Because they’ve seen my financial model.”
“They’ve read HR analysis.”
“They have not heard what a two-sentence denial costs a human being.”
Daniel was silent.
“I’m not asking for a speech.”
“What are you asking?”
“The truth.”
He drove to Portland.
Leaving Lily behind felt different this time.
Rosie Henson, Walt’s twenty-two-year-old granddaughter, came over with craft supplies and no expectation that Lily perform.
Daniel knelt beside Lily before leaving.
“I’m going to the city.”
Lily looked at him.
“I’ll be back before dinner.”
She nodded.
He touched Biscuit’s ear.
“Protect the house.”
Lily almost smiled.
Arcturus looked exactly the same.
That irritated him.
Glass.
Cold air.
Bad lobby music.
Raymond sat at security.
His eyebrows rose.
“Mr. Brooks.”
“Visitor now.”
Raymond smiled.
“That badge looks worse on you.”
Daniel received a temporary pass.
On the elevator, his body remembered before his mind did.
The slight lurch at floor five.
The chime.
The smell of coffee on twelve.
He hated how familiar it felt.
The boardroom sat on fourteen.
Floor-to-ceiling windows.
A table meant to make people feel important.
Evelyn sat at the head.
Victor Hale to her left.
Daniel had seen Victor hundreds of times.
Up close, the COO looked exactly like Daniel expected.