20 — Dean's Move

DEAN POV

I stared at the number on my screen until the digits stopped making sense, which didn't take long, because they'd stopped making sense three weeks ago and had only gotten worse since.

Two hundred and forty thousand dollars. Money I didn't have, owed to people who didn't accept "I'm working on it" as a payment plan.

It had started small, the way these things always did a few bad trades I was sure I could recover from, then a loan to cover the first loss, then another to cover that one, until the hole I'd dug myself was deep enough that climbing out of it honestly wasn't an option anymore. The men I owed weren't the kind who sent polite reminder emails. They'd made that very clear three nights ago, in a parking garage, in a conversation I hadn't told a single person about, least of all Kate.

Kate, who thought I was a rising associate with a bright future and a slightly stressful caseload. Kate, who had no idea her boyfriend was one missed payment away from finding out exactly how creative these people could get with consequences.

My phone buzzed. A text from a number I didn't recognize, though I knew exactly who it was from.

**UNKNOWN:** We understand you have access to Montgomery Industries through your relationship with the family. We're prepared to make your debt disappear entirely in exchange for one document, properly signed. No further payments required. Ever.

I read it three times before I let myself consider it seriously, and then I hated myself for how quickly the consideration turned into planning.

The document itself, they explained over the following days through increasingly specific messages, was a licensing agreement  buried in language dense enough that most people wouldn't catch what it actually did on a first read. Sign it, and Montgomery Industries would unknowingly hand over exclusive control of a patent portfolio worth considerably more than my entire debt, to a shell company that would then quietly resell the rights to interested parties overseas. Japheth would need to sign it. Someone would need to get it in front of him at exactly the right moment, framed as routine, buried among a dozen other routine approvals during a week busy enough that a careful read felt unnecessary.

I needed someone with direct access to his desk. Someone he trusted completely.

I thought of Jasmine, and I hated myself a little more for how obvious the answer was once I let myself think it.

****

I found her in the break room three days after she and Japheth got back from Seoul, looking lighter than I'd seen her in months, practically glowing with whatever had happened on that trip.

"Dean! I didn't know you'd be up here." She smiled, genuinely warm, the way she always was with me Kate's boyfriend, practically family by now, someone she'd never once had reason to be wary of.

I hated that too.

"Grabbing coffee before a meeting downstairs. How was Korea?"

"Incredible. I have about a thousand photos I need to show Kate before she starts asking specific questions I'm not ready to answer yet." She laughed, easy, unguarded.

I made small talk for a few minutes, easing into it the way I'd practiced in the mirror that morning, hating every second of my own performance.

"Can I ask you something?" I said finally, keeping my tone light. "Completely unrelated, work thing. I've got a client dealing with a licensing dispute, and I need a second opinion on some contract language before I file something. You're sharp with this stuff now financial analyst and all. Would you mind taking a look? Totally understand if you don't have the bandwidth."

"Of course, send it over. I love this kind of thing, honestly."

It was almost too easy, and something in my chest twisted at how easy it was, at how much she trusted the version of me that had walked into that break room five minutes ago.

"It might actually be more useful if you looked it over with Japheth's document management system pulled up  there's a template question I need answered that only really makes sense in context. Any chance I could swing by his office sometime this week when you're both free? Wouldn't take more than ten minutes."

I watched her hesitate, just slightly, some instinct flickering behind her eyes that I recognized as the same caution I'd need to be careful of going forward.

"Sure," she said finally, the hesitation smoothing over into simple friendliness. "I'll check his calendar and find a slot."

"Appreciate it. You're a lifesaver, Jasmine."

*A lifesaver.* I almost laughed at my own choice of words, standing there in a break room, already halfway down a road I knew I couldn't turn back from once I took the next step.

I left before she could see whatever was showing on my face, and sat in my car in the parking garage for a long time afterward, phone in my lap, the unknown number's messages still glowing on the screen.

**UNKNOWN:** Any progress?

I typed back before I could talk myself out of it.

**DEAN:** I have someone. Give me a week.

The response came almost instantly, like they'd been waiting.

**UNKNOWN:** Good. Don't disappoint us, Dean. We know where Kate works too.

I sat with that for a long moment, my hands not quite steady on the wheel, and told myself, the way I'd been telling myself for three weeks now, that this was the only way to protect the people I loved even as some smaller, quieter part of me understood exactly what I was about to do to one of them in order to save the others.