It is a temporary alliance of two hungers, and it dissolves the instant there is nothing left to feed on.

Conrad and Blair had mistaken their hunger for love, their conspiracy for a we. And when the audit turned the lights on, the we they had built my humiliation to protect turned out to have been, the whole time, just two people who would sacrifice each other in a heartbeat.

The restitution money went back to the company.

Some of it, in the end, was mine.

Chapter 24 — Eighteen Months Later

Eighteen months later, the morning sun came through the windows of my apartment, warm across the floor.