The color drained from Gavin’s face entirely, leaving him looking like a wax figure. “What?” “When you were leveraged out of Redwood Horizons, you had margin calls,” Jaime recited, walking around the desk to stand directly in front of him. “You took out high-risk personal loans to cover your losses on the commodities market. You owe four million dollars to three different banks. I bought those notes this morning at sixty cents on the dollar.” “You can’t do that,” Gavin stammered, backing away. “I own you,” Jaime said. Her voice was devoid of malice. It was simply the cold, hard weight of a mathematical certainty. “And I am calling the debt immediately.” “I can’t pay that,” Gavin screamed, his composure shattering. “I have no liquidity. I’ll be bankrupt. I’ll lose my house in Medina. I’ll lose my cars.” “Yes,” Jaime said calmly. “You will. You will lose the house. You will lose the Tesla. You will lose your country-club membership. You will have zero dollars to your name. You will know exactly what it feels like to stand in the rain and wonder if you can afford to eat dinner.”
Gavin looked at her, tears of sheer panic welling in his eyes. He realized, finally, that he was not speaking to a former waitress. He was speaking to a force of nature. “Jaime, please. You’re a billionaire. You don’t need this money. Why are you doing this?” “Because you didn’t just ignore me, Gavin,” Jaime whispered. “You erased people. You erased my father’s work. You erased me. You treated human beings like rounding errors.” Gavin fell to his knees. It was a pathetic sight. “I’ll do anything. Please. I need a chance. Just help me.”
Jaime looked down at him. For a moment, there was silence. Then she walked back to her desk. “You want a job?” she asked. Gavin looked up, hope sparking in his wet eyes. “Yes. Yes. Anything. Consultant. Analyst.” Jaime reached into the bottom drawer of her desk. She pulled out a ball of green fabric. She tossed it through the air. It landed on Gavin’s chest. He unfolded it slowly. It was an apron. The logo of the Grind and Circuit was faded on the front, and there was a faint, stubborn coffee stain on the pocket. “The café in the lobby is understaffed,” Jaime said. “They need someone to wipe tables and run the dishwasher. It pays minimum wage. And Gavin,” she added, a small, cold smile touching her lips, “the tips are pretty good if you smile.”
Gavin stared at the apron in horror. He stood up, clutching it. He looked at Jaime, then at the luxury of the office, and finally at the door. He realized there was no negotiation. There was no other exit. “Get out of my office,” Jaime said. He turned and walked out, a broken man carrying the symbol of his new life. When the door clicked shut, Jaime let out a long breath. She walked back to the window. The sun was beginning to pierce through the clouds, illuminating the city below. She touched the silver locket around her neck, opening it to see the tiny version of the photo on her desk. “We did it, Dad,” she whispered into the empty room. “We solved for X.”
She picked up her phone and dialed the number for the new laboratory downstairs. “Dr. Aris,” she said when the line connected. “It’s Jaime. Start the phase-one trials. I’m transferring the funds now. All of it.” She hung up and looked out at the horizon. She had delivered the solution, just as they had asked, and it was worth more than the millions they had tried to buy her off with. They had thought she was just a waitress. They had thought she was background noise. But Jaime Jenkins had proved that intelligence does not have a dress code, and that a variable, once written, does not disappear because someone erased the board. She had not just saved a company. She had honored her father, and she had dismantled the man who tried to crush her. Not with violence. With the one thing he could not buy. The math.