He paused for a moment, searching for his words. Seeing how upset she was, he wanted to make sure they were the right ones.
“Samiah, I’m sure it’s occurred to you that you can still work for the Outreach Department, even if you’re not the one who gets it off the ground. You said that Barrington seemed to be one hundred percent behind the idea. He won’t do away with it if you say no. He’ll just put someone else in the position.”
“It needs to be me,” she said. “I know I sound cocky, but I’m the best person for this job, Daniel. Barrington has more compassion than ninety-nine percent of the CEOs out there, but he isn’t doing this for altruistic reasons. This is to help Trendsetters’ image in the tech world. I want to make sure that Trendsetters isn’t the only winner here. No one else they put in that job will make an effort to seek out young people of color—specifically youngwomenof color—and bring them into STEM, or into Trendsetters. It’s not because they don’t think it’s important. Some don’t have a connection to the neighborhoods where the people I believe they should recruit live. Others just don’t see it as a priority.
“I’ve witnessed this time and again. Hiring directors will look at two résumés and hold all things constant. They don’t factor in how much harder that young black engineer had to work in order to get into that same position, and how that engineer will bring that same work ethic to the company.” She shook her head. “There is so much good that can come from this.”
“The same could be said for Just Friends,” he pointed out. “Who knows what it could lead to? You may be five years away from building your own Trendsetters, Samiah.”
“But can I afford to take that chance when so much is at stake? How selfish would it be of me to turn down the opportunity to do something that would make life better for so many more, simply because I’ve held this dream for an app that may never make it out of development?”
“Itwillmake it out of development,” Daniel said.
“But what if that’s as far as I can take it? What if I pass on being the department head and my app idea falls flat? Then what? I’m relying on someone like Owen Caldwell or—God forbid—Keighleigh Miller to do the right thing when it comes to outreach?”
She dropped her head back on the arm of the sofa and covered her eyes with her forearm again.
He paused for a beat before offering in a quiet voice, “You can always do both.”
She shook her head. “I’d rather choose a path and give one hundred percent. It wouldn’t be fair to either if I half-assed this.”
“What about if you had help?” She lifted her arm and peered at him from where she lay. He shrugged. “I do know my way around computer software and app development. I can help you get the app finished.”
“No,” she said with an emphatic shake of her head, then got up from the sofa and walked over to the wall of windows overlooking downtown Austin.
Daniel debated whether to give her some space, but only for a second. He joined her at the window, wrapping his arms around her middle and settling his chin against her shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean for that to sound as harsh as it did.”
“No need to apologize.”
“Stop being so nice.” She brought a hand up and ran it along his jaw. “Thank you for the offer,” she continued. “But this is something I have to do on my own. As I’ve said before, this app is my baby. If it ever goes to market, I want to know that I did it on my own.”
“Whenit goes to market,” he corrected. “And I understand where you’re coming from.” He pressed a kiss to the indentation between her neck and collarbone. “But it’s not as if I’m asking for co-developer status or anything, Samiah. I’m just saying that if you need some extra hands, I’m here.”
“I know.” She turned and settled her arms against his shoulders, clasping her slim fingers behind his head. “But I want to do this on my own. Ineedto do it on my own. I’ve held this dream for so long that this app is now a part of me. And at the end of the day, I want to be able to say that it was through my own blood, sweat, and tears that it came to be.”
She rested her head against his chest. Daniel enveloped her in his arms, pressing a kiss to her temple as he stared out at the watery scene beyond the double-paned windows.
He’d offered his help out of desperation to erase the sadness from her eyes. But as he thought about it, he couldn’t help but face a soul-crushing reality. He would be long gone by the time that tech conference came to Austin.
He didn’t have a hard-and-fast end date for this job, but he’d worked under Lowell Dwyer long enough to know that his boss had one. Daniel figured he had another month to uncover the individuals behind the money-laundering scheme before Dwyer either replaced him with someone else or scrapped the entire operation until they could gather more intel and try again.
He didn’t like it, but he understood those tough calls were sometimes necessary. Every operation had a cost-benefit analyst attached to it. There were a shitload of financial crimes being committed out there, and there was only so much manpower FinCEN could devote to each case. Trendsetters was a big one, but there were even bigger fish out there.
Like Vegas.
Shit.What was he going to do about Vegas? Was he willing to give that job up? A job that could make his career before he turned thirty?
It didn’t matter. By the time Samiah finished developing the prototype for her app, he would be gone. He’d banished those thoughts to far-off corners of his mind and tried not to think of them. But the reality remained.
She tipped her head back, looking up at him. “You know what’s funny about you offering to help me with the app? You shouldn’t have even known about it. I wasn’t going to tell you.”
“Why not?”
“Because you have the skills to steal my idea and develop it for yourself.”
“Hey—”
