Page 6 of Not Safe For Work

“This has nothing to do with my dating life—” She huffs. “Gabs, please relax. Olivia and I work together, and part of my job is coaching the rest of the team. Today it was her, tomorrow it could be Eddie needing a hand. I can’t refuse to work with her just because she…” I don’t finish the sentence because we all know how it ends.

“Maybe you don’t remember how messed up you were over her, but I do. You’re my family and I just—” Her voice breaks. “I never want to see you like that again.”

I roll my eyes, just as Kadesha says, “Dark times,” under her breath. Guilt swells through me, remembering how I ruined their first Christmas as a couple. Gabby and I were so excited to bring Kadesha into the mix, to show her our favorite traditions of days full of baking food from our childhood and watching cheesy holiday movies. But that Christmas, the only thing I wanted to ingest was alcohol, and the only movies I would watch ended in murder.

“It’s not like that, I swear.”

My sister sighs in resignation.“Es que no confío que no te haga daño.”

“Hey,” Kadesha interrupts. “No Spanish at the dinner table. You know I can’t understand you.”

Gabby cringes. It’s not unusual for her to slip into another language. She speaks five. When it’s just the two of us, it’s common to switch to Spanish since it’s what we both grew up speaking. Even if it has been almost twenty years since we left Argentina.

“Sorry,” she apologizes. “I just said I’m worried she’ll hurt him. And you know I can go a little ‘mama bear’ when it comes to my big brother.”

“Gabby,” I sigh.

“What? You need someone looking out for you. Who else is gonna do it if I don’t?”

“Babe, they work together.” Kadesha comes to my rescue, and I’m thankful because I’m more than tired of talking about this with my sister. She’s been pushing me to keep my distance from Liv for what feels like forever. “If he’s fine with it then maybe you should let it go.”

My sister plops back in her chair with a pout, her arms crossed over her chest like a petulant child. I can’t help but grin.

“How about a subject change?” Kadesha offers. “Any new goss at Sizzl?”

Gabby eyes me again.

“What?” This dinner is starting to feel like an interrogation.

“I heard a rumor about Davide…” she teases, drawing out all three syllables of his name like a song.

I let out a long exhale. How the hell did she hear about this? It’s supposed to be confidential for fuck’s sake.

“What’d you hear? Seriously, tell me.”

“Just because you’re friends doesn’t mean he gets a free pass for being a douche.”

Friends? I am notfriendswith Davide. And he is a douche. But he’s also one of the original eight. Those of us who basically started this company.

When Daanesh and Vaughn—our co-founders—got a huge round of funding by participating in Y Combinator, they hired eight people to build out departments and grow the company. Daanesh was a few years ahead of me at UC-Davis, but we met playing intramural rugby together. We stayed in touch after he graduated and started coding an entire marketing platform.When he reached out about a sales job, I thought he was joking, but he said that he and Vaughn both hated all the salespeople they’d interviewed and offered to give me a shot.

So there I was, fresh out of college, almost no experience, the only one out of the original eight that wasn’t already a Silicon Valley success. I was nowhere near ready, nor did I have any desire to lead a sales team, so once we locked down a few early clients, they brought in Mitch to head up the department.

Daanesh and I are still close friends, but I can’t stand Vaughn. He’s the one who has hired all my least favorite people and is on his way to tanking the company if he keeps letting the culture take a nose-dive.

Davide, our Head of Product, is his right-hand man, and it’s worth stating again, a huge douche.

“Please don’t say Davide and I are friends. You know I can’t stand the guy.”

“But you obviously know about the affair,” Gabby snaps back.

“An affair?” Kadesha asks, her big doe eyes lit up. “Like with someone from work?”

“Yeah,” Gabby continues. “He cheated on his wife with Megan in recruiting and,oh yeah,Megan was mysteriously let go for ‘performance issues.’ You know she might sue.”

“There is no proof that thereweren’tperformance issues.” I hate myself as I repeat the company line. I know it’s bullshit, but there’s nothing I can do about it. Gabby scoffs at me and I run a hand through my hair in annoyance. This dinner is the worst. “Look, I know Davide is horrible?—”

“Horrible? He took advantage of a girl half his age and got her fired when he was done with her. How can you defend him?”

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