Chapter 2 - The Fifteenth Page
Simon did not fire Cassidy that night. He did something that felt worse: he offered her a choice designed to leave him blameless.
"Sign an incident report saying you misunderstood the customer," he said, sliding a single sheet across his cramped office desk, "and I'll keep you on the schedule."
Cassidy read it. The report asserted that she had used a foreign language to mock Dominic's guests and had apologized for her conduct. Beneath the text was a blank line for her signature.
"I didn't apologize," she said.
"I know what happened. I was standing ten feet away."
"Then why does this say otherwise?"
Simon took off his glasses. He looked older without them. "Pierce's office called before he left the table. The owners are terrified. I have forty-two people working here, Cassidy."
"Forty-three, if I'm still one of them."
He didn't answer. Cassidy took a photograph of the report with his permission, wrote her own factual account, and left it on his desk unsigned. She returned her locker key. On the way out, the pastry chef slipped her a paper bag containing two almond croissants without making a speech about it.
Outside, the cold slapped her awake. She found Natalia's card in the pocket of her coat. The address belonged to a midtown legal office, not a hotel or a private apartment. Cassidy appreciated the difference. At eight the next morning she called, asked for a written description of the job, and requested to see the engagement terms before agreeing to meet.
Natalia sounded surprised. "You don't trust me."
"I met you at a table where a man was discussing taking other people's money. It's a healthy habit."
They met in a conference room with glass walls and a door Cassidy could leave through without permission. Natalia's attorney, Mara Ellis, introduced herself and placed three documents on the table: a confidentiality agreement limited to legitimate review material, a short-term independent translation contract, and written permission from Natalia's investment firm to examine the versions supplied during due diligence. Cassidy read each page. She negotiated a reasonable hourly fee and a provision stating her translation couldn't be edited and attributed to her without her approval.
"That's a lot of conditions," Natalia observed.
"You came to me because someone else skipped the conditions."
Victor joined by video. He looked more tired than he had at dinner. He explained that his group could finance the acquisition only after its own advisers verified that Harborline's employee-benefit reserve would remain separate from the purchase price. The disputed page appeared in a packet sent to him under a cover email claiming both language versions matched. He had asked Natalia to arrange another review after hearing Cassidy challenge Dominic.
Cassidy did not promise to prove fraud. "I can tell you what the words say, when I can establish which copies are authentic. Whether anybody committed a crime is another question."
Mara nodded. "That's exactly why you're here."
The first fourteen pages were tedious. Operating regions, cargo forecasts, insurance assumptions, maintenance schedules, obligations whose names changed slightly when translated between English and Russian. Cassidy compared them line by line and noted differences that mattered and differences that didn't. At lunch she ordered a sandwich and kept working while Natalia left to take a call.
Page fifteen contained the problem. It was titled an investor-continuity schedule. In the Russian version, a paragraph described eighty-six million dollars as a company-funded transition facility available to the acquisition group. The comparable English section, printed in a later appendix and carrying the same schedule reference, described a ring-fenced employee-benefit reserve to remain under independent administration. The Russian version included a further sentence permitting the amount to be assigned to a consultancy called North Quay Advisory upon closing. The English copy didn't contain that sentence at all.
Cassidy read both passages twice. She marked the words precisely. Then she checked the cover email. The sender was Evan Rusk, Dominic's chief contracts officer. The message had been transmitted after the law firms' last recorded meeting.
"I can certify the text differs," she told Mara. "I cannot tell you who inserted the paragraph from the language alone."
Natalia read Cassidy's draft and pressed two fingers against her temple. "Dominic told Victor the reserve was a buyer-funded guarantee."
"This draft calls it company-funded, and the English draft calls it employee money. Those are not interchangeable descriptions."
Victor asked if they could announce the discrepancy immediately. Cassidy shook her head.
"I would first establish the circulation history and whether either version was adopted. The wrong accusation will give Pierce an excuse to attack the right one."
Mara began requesting the authoritative document trail from both sets of counsel. Natalia authorized Cassidy to produce a clean comparison for the investors. It was the most intellectually satisfying work she'd done in years, and the feeling hurt because she remembered how much she'd loved her old profession before hospital corridors consumed her life.
At five, her father's billing agency called. The woman on the other end sounded tired rather than cruel. A promised payment was overdue. Cassidy explained she had lost a shift and had new contract work beginning. They discussed a revised date. When she hung up, she sat with her hands flat on the table until they stopped shaking.
Natalia returned with coffee. "You could ask for an advance."
"I could," Cassidy said. "And I will, against invoices. But my father's bills aren't evidence in your business dispute. I need those things separate."
For the first time, Natalia looked at her with something beyond professional interest. "Who taught you that?"
"My father. He fixed building elevators. He said if you can't explain which wire you touched, you shouldn't touch it."
That evening Cassidy left the office with a copy of her authorized translation and a receipt for her work. A man in a gray coat stood by the street-level elevator, looking at his phone. She passed him without a second glance. On the subway, she discovered a folded envelope tucked into the outside pocket of her bag.
Inside was a photograph of her pouring wine at Le Rêve.
On the reverse, in block capitals, someone had written: LANGUAGE CAN COST MORE THAN TIPS.
May you like
Cassidy did not throw it away. She photographed the envelope, told Mara exactly where she'd been, and called the transit police assistance line to document the incident. Then she went home, locked her apartment door, and kept working on the translation anyway.
The page was still fifteen pages long. Someone wanted her to pretend it didn't exist.
