“Don’t worry, I won’t act like that in front of Gus Winter,” she assures me as she falls back into her seat.
I shake my head. “Absolutely not. I want more of that when we meet with FundRight.”
Olivia lets out a soft, almost delirious-sounding laugh. “You want me to insult the potential seller to his face?”
“I want you to be yourself with Gus and his team. Don’t treat them like they walk on water. Just treat them like they’re regular people—which they are, I might add.”
“Treat them like they walk on water? I don’t do that.”
“You do,” I cut in knowingly. “I see how you talk to Lana and people around the office. You’re deferential and, honestly, a pushover. Status means as much as you let it. I think you’re putting too much weight on status.”
“I mean, I’m an intern, Davis.”
“So?”
“So, I’m trying to get a job here,” she reminds me needlessly. “I have to—”
“Eight years ago, I went to talk to a girl at a nightclub in Amsterdam. I was terrified out of my skin, but I knew I had to meet her after she turned down a free drink from a bunch of filthy rich assholes in the VIP section. God, I liked that girl.”
Olivia blinks quickly, almost as if she can’t process what I’m saying. “You did?”
“I know it’s weird to cite this as evidence, but I did sleep with her, didn’t I?”
“I thought it was because I was pretty—”
“Gorgeous. You still are.”
“—not because of my personality.”
“Both help,” I admit. “But the thing that brought me downstairs that night was how deeply unimpressed you were with our money and our perch up above you in the club. That’s almost never the case. Be that girl, Olivia. The real you.”
The sigh that escapes her lips is weighty, holding so much more than I know I could comprehend. She shakes her head. “It’s hard,” she explains after a moment. “There’s history. There are things in my past that make that hard for me. It’s like no matter how far I get in life, I’m always waiting for the catch. I’m waiting for someone to remind me that I don’t deserve it. That I’m just a girl who…”
When she trails off, I can fill in the blanks. A girl who lost her mother. A girl who raised her younger brother when she was trying to raise herself. A girl who had to sell her body to get by.
“You’re so much more to me,” I reply, drawing her eyes back to my face.
Olivia forces a placid expression, but there’s a tension that comes out in the soft furrow in her brow. “Wharton has this way of making me feel like I need to make the right connections and rub elbows with the right people.”
“I get that,” I agree, remembering how soul-sucking that was for me too. “But that’s because half the people there have no substance behind them. You—Olivia Nolan—you impress me. Other people feel the same. Don’t rely on schmooze and ass kissing to get what you want. Be you. Be cutting, be an asshole, be confident. I promise you, it’ll pay off.”