Never had been.
A simple gold band she wore when thinking.
The Single Dad had noticed that too.
He placed the audit on the table.
“You didn’t answer.”
She turned.
“I know.”
“Why are you here?”
“To tell you personally.”
“You could’ve called.”
“I didn’t want to call.”
“Email.”
“No.”
“Courier.”
“No.”
He folded his arms.
“You have an entire legal department.”
“Yes.”
“Executive assistants.”
“Yes.”
“A driver.”
“He’s downstairs.”
The Single Dad looked toward the window.
“You made someone sit in a car on Christmas Eve?”
“He has a family too.”
“So?”
“I told him to go home.”
The Single Dad stared.
“You drove yourself?”
“Yes.”
“In this weather?”
“I know how to drive.”
“In those shoes?”
“That has very little to do with driving.”
He almost smiled.
She saw it.
That seemed to encourage her.
The Female CEO stepped closer.
Not enough to be intimate.
Enough that he smelled her perfume now.
Something warm.
Amber.
Vanilla maybe.
He hated that he noticed.
She said:
“You really want the truth?”
“Yes.”
“I came because I didn’t want tonight to end without seeing you.”
The Single Dad’s expression changed.
The apartment felt suddenly smaller.
The Female CEO continued before he could respond.
“I sat at that ridiculous ballroom table for forty minutes.”
“There were investors on one side of me.”
“The board chairman on the other.”
“Everyone kept congratulating me on the quarter.”
“People wanted photographs.”
“Someone gave me a crystal sculpture shaped like our stock symbol.”
The Single Dad blinked.
“That sounds terrible.”
“It was hideous.”
He laughed once.
She smiled.
Then her expression softened again.
“And all I could think about was you sitting here believing the company had decided you were disposable.”
He looked away.
“That’s dramatic.”
“It’s accurate.”
“I’m cleared now.”
“Yes.”
“So problem solved.”
“No.”
The Single Dad looked back.
The Female CEO stepped closer again.
“You lost three weeks with your daughter wondering whether her father would still have a job.”
“You had your reputation questioned.”
“You had people who worked with you every day decide silence was safer than standing beside you.”
“You were asked to resign before the investigation was done.”
“An audit does not erase that.”
The Single Dad’s jaw tightened.
“No.”
“And I signed the termination.”
Silence.
There it was.
The part neither had said since she arrived.
The Female CEO had not personally accused him.
But her signature had ended his position.
The Single Dad stared at her.
“You approved it.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
She did not defend herself.
That surprised him.
“Because the evidence in front of me supported it.”
“That evidence was wrong.”
“I know.”
“You’re the CEO.”
“Yes.”
“You’re supposed to know.”