Lucy was an only child, raised by her single mother and a host of nannies. She was a surprise—what she always imagined was an unpleasant one—to her career-minded mother and the product of a business arrangement even as a fetus. Her father sent cards and stock options on her birthday and for each night of Hanukkah, and in exchange, she posed for photos with him to “humanize” him in the Wall Street Journal. She saw him once a year, and in truth, that was enough for Lucy. They had a cordial relationship but not a warm one. Not that her relationship with her mom was particularly warm either, but that had always been fine with Lucy.

She appreciated her mom treating her like an adult from the time she was two and would take that over home-baked cookies any day (and her trim waistline thanked her for it). Her mom pushed for long enough that when she stopped, Lucy pulled, the desire to excel infused into her thanks to nature and nurture.

And Lucy did. She excelled in school and tennis and marathons and did it all while living too, having fun, something her mom had long ago forgone. Serious was one thing, dull was another. Strategize, stylize, socialize. It was all three that led to corner offices.

Which Lucy had had her eye on since she could say the words “Silicon Valley.” Which was why she’d interned at a startup in San Francisco the summer before sophomore year in high school. Which was why she’d worried she was already behind when she found a sixth grader there “shadowing” the CEO.

One night, she’d hopped on an earlier Caltrain home because her dad was visiting. She opened the door to their faux Spanish-style McMansion and heard the ice—one cube, only ever one—tink in her mom’s tumbler before she heard her say, “She’ll never be me.”

The chill she thought she’d left behind with the San Francisco fog iced her to the bone. They were never the “popcorn and rom-com and cucumber facial” mother-daughter-bonding-night type (her mom would have to have been home before bedtime for that). But Lucy thought she was following in her footsteps. Sure, maybe she wasn’t the techie her mom had been, but Lucy surpassed her mom in people skills and likability and, well, having a life. Which Lucy was determined to do even harder from that moment on.

And then Stanford and freaking Gavin Cox. And now Ryan Thompson.

Her mother was right about Lucy not being her. Lucy had never wanted to be.

Until now.

Lucy decided not to call her mom. She had Maddie and Delia. She had her friends.

*   *   *

They sat in a row of three on the couch in the living room attached to the Head of House’s apartment.