I Signed the Papers the Night of the Gala

I signed the papers in the back of a town car and walked into his gala to watch the industry hand him an award for the company I built. Eighteen months later I have two rooms in Chelsea, one hire, and a contract I cannot lose. Grant has a bleeding quarter, an empty co-founder's office, and my name still engraved on the lobby wall because he never got around to ordering someone to take it down. Now he wants to buy my firm. I want to buy his. Somewhere between the counter-offers and the blackout and the wedding with the table assignment that wasn't an accident, I stop pretending this is about the company. He says he'll resign. He says he'll sign anything. He says it on a fire escape in the rain, which is a cliché he should know better than to use on me. I take the resignation. The rest is a courthouse and two witnesses and no press.