Victoria closed the laptop and put her head in her hands.
He had tested her, and she had failed. She had not just failed. She had failed spectacularly, publicly, with witnesses recording.
Her phone buzzed. Not Darien.
A text from her PR person read: Bloomberg is calling. They want a comment on the incident. What should I tell them?
Victoria did not respond.
At 8:00, she tried calling Darien again. The line did not even ring this time. Straight to voicemail.
He had blocked her number.
She tried emailing from her personal account.
Mr. Cole,
I understand if you never want to speak to me again, but I'm begging you to consider the 3,000 employees at Ashford Technologies who have nothing to do with my terrible judgment. Please.
No response.
At 10:00, she was still in her office. The janitor knocked and asked if she was working late. She waved him away.
At 11:00, she finally went home. She did not sleep.
At 2:00 in the morning, she sat with her laptop reading everything she could find about Darien Cole. His background. His mother working multiple jobs. His scholarship to MIT. The companies he had built. The founders he had mentored.
There was a video of him speaking at a conference for entrepreneurs. He wore jeans and a Stanford hoodie. He looked relaxed, happy.
"The system wants you to play by rules that weren't written for you," he said in the video. "Sometimes the most radical thing you can do is just be yourself. Show up as you are. If they respect you, great. If they don't, you just saved yourself years of working with the wrong people."
The audience applauded. Darien smiled.
Victoria closed the laptop. She sat in the dark of her Pacific Heights home, surrounded by expensive furniture and art she barely looked at.
She had ruined everything. Not because she made a mistake, but because she had revealed exactly who she was.
And Darien Cole had seen it clearly.
The next morning, Victoria stood in the lobby of Cole Ventures headquarters in Manhattan. She was wearing yesterday's cream Chanel suit.
It was wrinkled. There was a coffee stain on the sleeve that she had not been able to remove in the airplane bathroom.
The red-eye from San Francisco had been six hours of staring at the seat in front of her. No sleep, just the flight tracker counting down miles.
Cole Ventures occupied 40 stories of glass and steel. The lobby had white marble floors that echoed every footstep. Modern art hung on pristine walls. The receptionist desk looked like it cost more than most cars.
Victoria approached. The receptionist was young and professional, with a name tag that read Lisa.
"Good morning. I need to see Darien Cole."
Lisa's fingers paused over her keyboard. "Do you have an appointment?"
"No, but it's urgent. I'm Victoria Ashford."
"I'm sorry, Ms. Ashford. Mr. Cole only sees people by appointment."
"Please just tell him I'm here. Five minutes. That's all I need."
Lisa looked uncomfortable. She picked up her phone and spoke quietly.
Victoria could not hear the words, but Lisa glanced at her twice.
Lisa hung up. "I'm sorry. Mr. Cole is in meetings all day."
Victoria's stomach dropped. "I'll wait."
"Ma'am, he could be in meetings until six or seven."
"I'll wait."