I mean I want to know their dick sizes.”
“To the inch,” I added. “And if they know the Kama Sutra, tell me all the poses you’ve done.”
“My fiancé’s massive dick aside and Kama Sutra expertise aside”—Cameron smirked, waving us off—“why don’t you tell us what happened today, Moon?”
“Of course,” I said, with forced perkiness. “But first, can I have Roxanne make you guys a green salad or a smoothie? I also brewed a special ginger kombucha mix that’s really great for digestion and spiritual—”
“Luna.” Daisy laid a stern hand on my shoulder. “You can’t distract us with your hippie fairy dust. Give us the damn dirt, girl.”
I tucked the edges of my skirt beneath my knees. My stacked gold rings clicked on the cool concrete—they were made to look cheap, yet they’d actually cost me more than a year’s worth of rent on my old apartment. The one I’d lived in before I won the Turner VC Award.
“Ferris Mark lied to us,” I said, launching into the day’s shocking news. I recounted everything—the utter despair at realizing I’d employed and paid a company that force-fed cosmetic ingredients to mice to test fatal reactions, among other things. The news story. The online bullying. The document.
“You signed off on it?” Emily asked.
“I sure did. And gladly too, it would appear,” I said.
“Oh, Moon,” Daisy said.
“Been there,” Cameron said. “It sucks.”
“And you know I have too,” Emily said. “You’d like to think the opinions of strangers about your morality won’t affect you. But you’d have to be superhuman to not be hurt by it.”
“That’s true, I guess,” I said.
I felt almost sick with guilt and embarrassment and a full-body shame that had me achy and uncomfortable. I pressed my forehead to my knees, listened to the sound of crashing waves, a sound I’d lived with since childhood. My gold rings glittered in the pale moonlight. I felt a pinch of… something. More guilt, maybe?
“Thank you for not calling me a big fat fraud like the entire internet,” I said.
“The internet can suck it,” Cameron said. “It’s impossible to avoid this stuff, Moon. I think things will get better after you apologize. That’s what Jasmine’s going to have you do, right?”
“Yep. That’s the first step,” I said, feeling a jolt of nerves.
“And what’s the rest of the cleanup plan?” Emily asked. “And may I remind you that I happen to know a professional fixer?”
I blew out a breath. “Apologize. Fix all of the errors. Pull the products. Work on a message of transparency. Find a new, reputable supplier. Get everyone to like me again.”
“Easy-peasy.” Daisy winked.
“You know,” Cameron said, tapping her glass, “when we all first met you, the only reason you wanted to make this much money was to give it all away. You were our little bohemian philanthropist.”
“That’s right,” Emily said. “I actually thought you were going to join the Peace Corps.”
Once upon a time, I was going to join the Peace Corps—but the inspiration for Wild Heart had struck and I’d shifted to majoring in business instead.
“I give money away all the time,” I said. “I just don’t have time to volunteer like I used to. You know how intense running an enormous business is. My time is all booked up now.”
My best friends tilted their heads at me like a trio of judgmental owls.
“What?” I asked. “I have.” I traced my history of philanthropy back a few years. I had a handful of favorite nonprofits I used to make large, monthly gifts to. Holding on to that much money when I was newly wealthy had never felt quite right. Surely I’d been giving it away since becoming a billionaire.
Right?
“Tomorrow I’ll have Jasmine pull some numbers,” I finally choked out.
Then I stuffed a handful of chips into my mouth.
“Moon.” Daisy nudged my foot with her own. My rings mocked me in the starlight. “Not giving money away doesn’t make you a bad person. It is interesting though, don’t you think? Given what your values are?”
“I’ve been busy,” I said.
Busy becoming the face of Wild Heart, I would have said, had I been feeling more courageous. But until I’d learned the makeup products that my company sold came from an evil company, I had felt like I was helping change the world every day. Words were powerful.
So what if I spent hours online getting the message out there? That’s how real change was made.
“Re-dedicating yourself to your values can be a really powerful way to earn trust,” Emily said thoughtfully. “I just