She might not forgive me, but I still had to find a way to support her. She’d gone marching into this by herself and I couldn’t let her bear the brunt of it alone.

I texted my team to come over immediately so we could work through a strategy, then felt like I was going out of my mind waiting for them to get there. I swung from the height of toxic masculinity—fighting the urge to drive to Max’s house and beat him senseless, taking Elena his front teeth as an apology offering—to gut-wrenching heartbreak, replaying those conversations with Elena when she’d talked about how a scary incident at work was the least of her worries when it came to men. She’d always referenced one particular bad client. Now that he had a face, it was far too real. And not just any face, the face of a man I’d enjoyed working with. Was I on set with him the next day, cracking jokes while Elena fought for the bravery to go back to work and trust her clients again?

I was still shaking with anger by the time Asha, Chad, and Rami arrived, but needed to focus on what we could do to help her.

“How do we handle this?” I was hoping these strategic minds could see a clearer path forward than I could.

Chad paced at the window, then turned back to me slowly. “This is going to be an unpopular opinion, but hear me out…I’ve talked to crisis management and I’ve talked to Max. We don’t really know what happened between them. There are two sides to every story. Max doesn’t deny he was a client, but says she agreed to or instigated everything between them and is now just trying to drum up press by making herself a victim. Point is, he’s got friends in high places and you’re not gonna do yourself any favors taking sides on this. We issue the breakup statement as planned, don’t comment on this controversy, and let this whole thing blow over without getting dragged into it.”

I stared at him, unsure how I couldn’t have seen him for what he truly was before. We’d been working together for almost ten years. In some ways, I had him to thank for my success. Maybe I’d been blind to his faults this long because I felt like I owed him something.

“You’re fired,” I said simply, turning to the others. “If either of you feel the same way, there’s the door.”

Asha glanced at the door and went straight back to her computer. Rami walked across the room, and for a second I actually thought he was leaving, but all he did was hold the door open and look at Chad expectantly.

Chad sputtered and tried to argue, backpedaling to say, “Whoa, calm down, man. If you want to handle it another way, that’s fine. I’m just doing my job and looking out for your career.”

“Some things matter more than my career. Issuing that statement today and not commenting would be as good as announcing we’re breaking up because I don’t believe her.”