There was no time, and it was not my way.

But I will not pretend there was no fierce, cold joy in it — the joy of the underestimated, walking at last toward the moment the underestimating stops.

She had laughed at me over champagne.

In a few minutes, in front of everyone whose respect she had, she was going to understand exactly what she had been laughing at.

Chapter 14 — Nine Fifty-Five

At five minutes to ten, the glass doors of Sterling Global’s top-floor boardroom framed a portrait of absolute, unearned confidence.