Chapter 18

At Kerry's premium B-tier rate, one hundred classes equated to roughly $800,000.

Vanguard catered exclusively to the ultra-rich, so seeing a six-figure contract drop wasn't entirely unprecedented. But the fact that it was Clifton Condon dropping the money completely changed the gravity of the situation.

Stripped of all the usual corporate groveling and small talk, the signing process was executed with blinding speed. Barely ten minutes later, Clif stepped out of the reception room. Kerry trailed behind him to see him out. Maggie stayed behind in the room, terrified that if she hovered too close, she might accidentally breathe wrong and offend him.

Stopping at the elevators, Kerry pressed the call button and turned to him with a genuine, brilliant smile. "Thank you again, Mr. Condon. I will work hard and make sure I don't let you down."

Clif didn't look at her. "Mutual help," he muttered.

Kerry weighed those two words carefully. Mutual help. The transaction was crystal clear. She nodded silently. The steel doors slid open, Clif stepped inside, and Kerry offered a polite bow. "Take care on your way back."

When she walked back into the bullpen, her coworkers were practically vibrating. Congratulations poured in from every cubicle. Liz Pearl raised her voice over the chatter. "Ms. Jones! A massive victory on your first week? Isn't it time you treated us to dinner to celebrate?"

"Of course," Kerry laughed smoothly, playing the corporate game to perfection. "I've been meaning to invite everyone out since I arrived, but you're all always so busy. You guys know the city better than I do. You pick the place and time, and I'll cover the bill."

"Don't worry," Liz grinned. "Even though you just landed a whale, we won't slaughter your wallet. We'll find somewhere good but affordable. It's mostly just to celebrate you!"

"Then I'll leave the arrangements to you, Liz," Kerry smiled.

Going from a precarious trial to a massive, official contract in a single afternoon was enough to give Kerry whiplash. She knew the office would gossip, but she severely underestimated how fast the news would breach the walls of Vanguard.

Barely an hour later, as she sat at her desk, her phone buzzed. It was a text from Daniel Heimler.

Daniel: You signed the official contract with Condon?!
Kerry: How do you know already?
Daniel: That's what I call slow! A classmate of mine who works at a rival agency just texted me to ask if it was true. The entire tutoring industry is talking about it!

Kerry replied with a sticker of a dumbfounded goose.

Daniel: Did Clifton Condon personally come to sign it?
Kerry: Yeah.
Daniel: What the hell does he mean by that? Is he into you?
Kerry: I'll tell you tonight.

Before she could even lock her screen, another message popped up. It was Zoe Price.

Zoe: You locked down the official contract with THAT guy?!
Kerry: ...Seriously, where are you getting your gossip?
Zoe: Ray Singer just personally called me to invite me to dinner and congratulate me! I was like, congratulate me for what?! He said you signed the official contract with Condon. That's how I found out!

The dumbfounded goose sticker was no longer sufficient to express Kerry's internal crisis. She typed back: Did they plant a bug on Clifton Condon? Is there no such thing as a secret anymore?

Zoe: I told you! Clif's every move in this city is watched by thousands. Plus, he personally showed up at your office in broad daylight. He clearly isn't trying to hide it... Wait, no, seriously, you've only been to his house twice! How did you lock him down? Did you feed him a magic potion, or did he brainwash you?

Daniel’s texts were simultaneously blowing up her phone with a dozen more questions. With no other choice, Kerry opened their three-person group chat and sent a single audio message: "We will talk over dinner."

That night, the three of them convened in a private dining room. Kerry calmly laid out exactly what had happened at lunch with Darby Tucker, and Clif's explosive comment in the living room.

Daniel and Zoe exchanged a heavy, loaded look.

"So the rumors are completely baseless," Zoe said, sipping her drink.

"What exactly do the Condon men think you are?" Daniel demanded, stabbing a piece of beef with his chopsticks. "A convenient target? A human shield?"

Kerry took a bite of her meal, completely unbothered. "It's not the weasel paying respects to the chicken, and it's not a secret plot to ruin me. I told you both—if Clif was the type of man to think with his lower half, I never would have engaged with him in the first place."

Zoe frowned deeply. "But the way he acted today... he's deliberately using you to piss off that Tucker woman. He elevated you just to spite her."

"So what?" Kerry countered smoothly. "First of all, their internal family drama has nothing to do with me. Second of all, when gods fight, mortals shouldn't try to play peacekeeper. We have a strictly transactional relationship. Why should I complain about his motives when I’m the one cashing the check? That’s just biting the hand that feeds you."

Kerry was logical to the point of being terrifyingly cold. For a moment, neither Zoe nor Daniel could find a flaw in her argument.

"It’s great that Clif doesn't have ideas about you," Daniel argued, clearly upset. "But what if the woman doesn't see it that way? You're being pushed out as a human shield. You think you can just stay out of it, but what if the trouble comes looking for you? You can't just say 'I'm not involved' when the fire is at your door."

"That’s exactly why Clif didn't hesitate to give me the official contract," Kerry replied evenly. "It’s a preventative measure. Think of it as hazard pay."

"You're still the one carrying all the risk," Daniel grumbled.

Kerry put her chopsticks down, raised her eyes, and looked at him dead on.

"Daniel. Life isn't some idealistic dream. You don't get to quit school just because you don't like your classmates, and you don't get to quit your job just because office politics are annoying. When an employer pays a salary, that money doesn't just cover your physical labor—it covers your ability to manage interpersonal relationships and handle sudden crises. It's survival of the fittest."

She leaned forward slightly, her voice dropping into a sharp, commanding register. "Don't give me that 'doing it for the money is beneath us' routine. Everyone has different goals. Your family is sitting on literal oil fields back home, yet you flew halfway across the country to suffer in this city. Why? Because you're chasing my college upperclassman. You willingly take on every single obstacle for your goal. You constantly say, 'If gods block me, I'll kill gods; if demons block me, I'll slay demons.' So why, when it comes to my life, am I suddenly not allowed to swallow a little injustice to get what I want?"

As always, Daniel was rendered entirely speechless, his mouth opening and closing without a sound.

Kerry picked her chopsticks back up and casually resumed eating.

Zoe, who had spent years thoroughly enjoying Kerry putting Daniel in his place, reached across the table and patted his head sympathetically. "Alright, alright, don't argue back. When Professor Jones gives a free public lecture, we just sit quietly and listen."

Daniel finally let out a long, heavy sigh. "I know you have a spine of steel, Kerry. But doesn't it exhaust you to fight this hard?"

"Who isn't exhausted in this life?" Kerry murmured, her eyes remaining fixed on her plate. "Suffer now, enjoy it later. You either suffer for a little while, or you suffer for the rest of your life. That is the only choice we actually get to make."

Zoe and Daniel both knew Kerry's family background. They weren't surprised by her desperate, clawing need to survive, but it still broke their hearts sometimes. Kerry Jones was the most ruthless, stone-hearted person they knew—especially when it came to herself.