Hush Money

Book excerpt: Ebony, a twenty-eight-year-old Black woman living in Texas, was going through a divorce, living with her mom in poverty, and finding it hard to make ends meet. After years of working dead end jobs, she received a phone call from a temp agency that changed her life in the best way, and also the worst way. A call that began her six-figure career in higher education, and her descent into Racial Discrimination Hell. The temp assignment was at Daebrun Career Institute, a popular, for-profit college with several campuses in the State of Texas. And after only two short months, Daebrun hired Ebony permanently, and she was thrilled to have a chance to live the American dream. But the American dream, the dream that made her believe she could have the same opportunities given to White employees, became a living nightmare, after Ebony's boss resigned, and was replaced with a racist one.Over the course of five years, Ebony's bosses changed, but the racism didn't as each one tried to break her, like she was a wild horse they were determined to tame. She was degraded and dehumanized with threats and fear, humiliated on a daily basis, and stripped of all dignity, confidence, and strength. The environment she was forced to work in was so hostile she considered killing her boss, or herself, to escape the torment.After years of suffering, Ebony found courage through faith and the love of her mom, learned how to fight back through trial and error, and made the transition from racial discrimination victim to racial discrimination victor by proving the existence of systemic racism in her workplace, obtaining a six-figure settlement from her employer to buy her silence, and maintaining her employment for several more years.