Free Great Exploitations (Crisis in Cali) by Nicole Williams

seriousness in his expression to iron out. After another minute, it still hadn’t.
    “Are you serious?” When I peeked out the window again, all I saw were the wisps of clouds as we passed through them.
    “When it comes to you, to us, I’m always serious.”
    “Where we’re going . . . you have it in mind to stay there forever? As in to move there and live there and one day die there?”
    He nodded. “Sounds perfect.” My mouth was dropping when he noticed the shock on my face. “Or for as long as you like. I’ll leave the duration of our stay totally up to you. As long as I get to be with you, I’ll go wherever, whenever.”
    When I realized he was serious about leaving it all behind, everything, I took a few minutes to think seriously about it. The concept was appealing on a level I couldn’t quite grasp, but our lives weren’t so simple to leave behind. “You do realize you’re the CEO of one of the largest IT companies in the world, right? How could you just walk away from that?”
    “Because I’m walking away with you.” His fingers squeezed mine.
    “Henry, be serious—”
    “Believe me, I am being serious. As serious as I’ve ever been.” If his words didn’t convince me, his expression did. “I’ve had nothing but time to think about this moment, and believe me when I tell you I only dared to dream it. If you think that, against every odd and probability, I’d waste my chance to live it for real, you must not remember the man who meant it when he said nothing was more important than you.”
    With each moment that passed, it became easier for me to accept that he was being serious. “But what will happen to Callahan Industries if you just up and leave? What will happen to all of your employees? They’ll be out of jobs, and sub-par software will flood the market if your company shuts down.”
    He shook his head. “I’m not going to shut down Callahan Industries. I might be selfish when it comes to you, but I’m not so selfish that I’d put thousands of people out of jobs just like that.”
    I exhaled. “So you’ll be flying back and forth between the Bay and wherever we’re heading right now?”
    He shook his head again. “No, of course not. I’m handing over the control and daily management of the company to a certain person I introduced you to—”
    “Max—your number two.”
    “Now he’s number one.”
    “But . . .” That was all I could conjure up.
    “It’s done. Max will oversee Callahan Industries as the new CEO, and I’ll play an omniscient sort of role by checking in every once in a while.”
    It took me a few breaths before I could say anything. “You’re leaving it all behind. Your company, your family, friends . . . your fake wife.” I raised my eyebrows. “You’re leaving it all behind to be with me at some to-be-determined dot on the map.”
    Henry’s face ironed out as he leaned across my seat. His lips brushed mine once, then twice. “I’m not leaving anything behind.”

 
     
    NOT A DAY had gone by when I hadn’t thought about that flight. The one where we’d both taken the proverbial leap, chosen each other, and left everything else behind. Of course, making the leap was one thing, and living with the repercussions of the leap was something else. But in our case, the repercussions were few and far between.
    Henry had far more to deal with than I did. True to his word, he checked in with Callahan Industries every once in a while via conference calls and emails. His family had been shocked, in every definition of the word, to discover he’d faked a marriage to get back to the girl they’d tried to permanently rid him of years ago. He’d had one last conversation with his mom on the phone, and after that, they seemed to leave him alone. I wasn’t sure what he’d said, but whatever it had been, his family had finally accepted that Henry and I couldn’t be separated, despite their best attempts.
    It had been difficult at first to realize that