Alexandra Vale had been Chief Executive Officer for exactly forty-three minutes when she decided Daniel Mercer was finished.
She stood in the center of MeridianPay’s operations floor and looked at the sleeping man as if he personally represented everything she intended to change about the company.
The room surrounding them was one of the most expensive operational spaces in American finance.
Glass walls.
Rows of curved workstations.
A twenty-four-foot monitoring display stretching across the far wall.
Transaction maps.
Fraud alerts.
Settlement statistics.
Live bank connections.
Millions of payments moving across the screens every minute.
And at the center of it all sat a man asleep.
Not quietly resting in some forgotten corner.
Asleep at the primary systems-control station.
His head rested against one hand.
His pale-blue dress shirt was badly wrinkled.
The collar hung open.
Brown hair fell across his forehead.
Dark stubble covered a face that might have been handsome if exhaustion had not hollowed the skin beneath his eyes.
One hand still rested beside the keyboard.
Alexandra stopped walking.
Behind her, the executives accompanying her on the ceremonial first-day tour stopped too.
Nobody spoke.
That annoyed her almost as much as the sleeping employee.
They were waiting to see what she would do.
New CEOs were judged before their first board meeting.
Too soft?
Weak.
Too aggressive?
Insecure.
Too cautious?
Unprepared.
Alexandra had spent fourteen years learning that powerful rooms gave women less room for ambiguity than men.
So she had entered MeridianPay determined not to offer any.
She stepped toward the workstation.
The engineer did not move.
Someone behind her quietly said:
“That’s Daniel Mercer.”
Alexandra glanced back.
The Chief Operating Officer stood two steps away.
“You know him?”
“He’s senior infrastructure.”
“Apparently very senior.”
Nobody laughed.
Good.
Alexandra looked down.
An employee access badge lay beside Daniel’s keyboard.
She picked it up.
DANIEL MERCER
SENIOR SYSTEMS ENGINEER
LEVEL 7 ACCESS.
Alexandra tapped the plastic badge against the desk.
Nothing.
She hit the desk harder.
Daniel opened his eyes.
Slowly.
For one second he seemed not to know where he was.
Then he saw Alexandra.
Then the executives.
Then his badge between her fingers.
His expression did not become frightened.
That irritated her.
“Good morning,” Alexandra said.
His voice was rough.
“Is it?”
She stared at him.
The Chief Operating Officer shifted uncomfortably.
Alexandra lifted Daniel’s badge.
“You know who I am?”
He rubbed one hand over his face.
“Alexandra Vale.”
“Position?”
“CEO.”
“Good.”
At least he had been conscious enough to read the announcement.
Alexandra leaned one hand against the desk.
“This is my first morning running this company.”
Daniel nodded weakly.
“I know.”
“And I find a senior engineer asleep at the central operations console.”
He glanced toward the monitors.
“Yes.”
“Anything you’d like to say?”
Daniel stared at her for several seconds.
Then:
“Don’t restart Core Settlement.”
Alexandra blinked.
“What?”
“Don’t restart it.”
She straightened.
“I asked about you sleeping.”
“I heard you.”
“Then answer the question.”
Daniel glanced toward his screens again.
His eyelids looked painfully heavy.
“Later.”
That did it.
Alexandra’s jaw tightened.
She looked toward security.
Two guards had followed the executive tour at a respectful distance.
She gestured.
One moved forward.