The employment letter had arrived on a Tuesday.
Lance had read it once, sitting at his kitchen table in the late afternoon quiet of his apartment, coffee going cold beside him.
He had read the company name and then put the letter down and stared at the wall for a while.
Then he picked it up and read it again just to be sure.
Lowell Corporation.
He laughed.
It came out short and dry and without a single trace of humor in it. The kind of laugh that surfaces when the universe does something so specifically absurd that your body doesn't know how else to respond.
His friend Caleb, whose uncle sat on the board of three separate companies and played golf with people whose names appeared on buildings, had promised him a recommendation somewhere they were used to difficult personalities.
Somewhere that valued results over temperament.
