“Again,” he insisted, “you knew about this and didn’t tell your best friend?”
“I knew you would react like this.”
“Like what!”
“Like it was a big deal.”
“Big deal?Big deal?”A manic laugh bubbled up out of him. “A big deal, he says. Fucking hell, Mikey. I knew Ginny was great in bed, but I didn’t know she was a pro.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m not being figurative. I mean she’s literally a pro. A professional.”
“I know what you mean.”
“Someone whogets paidto do it.”
“I understand the concept, August.”
He ran his fingers through his hair and began pacing back and forth in the hall. “Mikey, what are we going to do.”
“I don’t know.” I felt strangely detached from it all. “I think I love her. I’m going to tell her.”
“Damn, Mikey. That’s great. But I meant what are we going to do with the absolute shitshow of a situation we have on our hands?”
I glanced at my phone. A meeting request had just popped up. “I guess we should go to the emergency board meeting.”
“And do what?”
“Hell if I know. But we can’t let this happen to her.”
“And how are we supposed to stop it?” August asked. He was gesturing wildly, like a man rapidly losing his mind. “Claim that her pornographic side hustle is a good thing for the foundation? Or maybe deny that it’s her, despite Sandra’s proof? Oh! I’ve got it. We can tell them that we can’t fire her because we’re both sleeping with her, and it would totally ruin the mood of our three-person sex affair!Let’s do that!”
“I’ll meet you there,” I said.
“I’m not hearing any solutions, Mikey.”
“I said I’ll meet you there.”
I went back to my office and closed the door. Julia came by and knocked, but I waved her off through the window.
What am I going to do?
I felt numb to everything. I had spent the last few days thinking about Ginny. Collecting my thoughts, and taking stock of how I felt. And just when I had come to a decision about it all,thishappened. Her life was destroyed in the most public, humiliating way possible.
I didn’t even care that Sandra knew I was sleeping with Ginny. My empathy for her was so strong that I didn’t have any room to worry about myself.
But try as I might, I couldn’t think of a way out of this. Or at least a legal way. For a brief ten seconds, I considered killing Sandra. That could solve Ginny’s problem, but it would create a bunch of new ones, and even if it didn’t, I knew it was something I could not do. I wasn’t a killer. Not even for the woman I loved.
The board of directors for the New Mexico Community Foundation met in the large conference room, which was located on the inner part of the building without windows. The light was harsh and unnatural, a stark contrast to the sunlight that filled the offices around the exterior of the building. Six members of the board were physically present, and the projector screen listed eight more who had dialed in remotely. We had a quorum.
So much for hoping that nobody would show up.
I knew that the board didn’t need to meet for something like this. The CEO had total discretion when it came to hiring decisions, and could simply fire Ginny and notify the board of the reason later. He must have called this meeting to show everyone that he was taking care of it. A public reveal such as Ginny’s required a public solution.
August walked into the room. We locked eyes, and I knew that he was out of ideas too.
Numbly, I sat down at the sprawling conference table. I was the lowest ranking person here. My opinion held little weight. Not that it mattered. There was no defense for this. Sure, Ginny was running her OnlyFans page in her private time. She wasn’t breaking any laws. But employing someone like her looked bad, and the foundation was obsessed with appearances. Cornelius would explain the situation, put it to a vote, and she would be fired. I felt powerless.