Empire of Lies

by Whitney G.

  Curious, I pulled my phone from my pocket—hoping it was Athlete457, the sexy brown-eyed guy who I’d swiped right on during my morning commute. I opened the app and saw that it was him, but it wasn’t him at the same time.

  The name was the same, but the pictures weren’t. Instead of a cute guy kicking around a soccer ball, these were all shots of the ‘too good to be fucking true’ sexy guy I’d swiped left on the other night. Yet somehow, these pictures were even sexier than the ones before.

  He was wearing all black in every shot—business attire that covered his neck and silky woven ties that looked like the exact kind I’d seen on runways. His watches were definitely photo-shopped onto his wrist, seeing as though his previous pictures featured five different Audemar Piguet watches and these pictures featured five different types of Rolex ones.

  He must’ve changed his pictures after I ‘liked’ him. Ugh. What a troll…

  As I was preparing to get rid of him, I saw that he was updating his name again. This time, he was shortening it to The Devil. From the small chat box, I could even see that he was preparing to send me a message.

  Ugh. Seriously?

  I took screenshots of his face for much-needed vibrator use later. Then I “un-liked” him and flagged his account for fraud.

  Michael

  Before

  I never understood what would make someone willingly apply for a job in corporate America. Between the monotonous hours, the chicken-shit pay, and the tedious tightrope treading across a fragile CEO’s ego, there was little to admire. It was why I remained completely unimpressed whenever I met a suit. They all talked and walked the same, and they honestly thought that they ran my city.

  They had no idea about the gritty underbelly shit that kept the wheels turning while they were sleeping. No idea that every dime in their banks, every share from their investors, and every person who walked in and out of their sleek-colored buildings were all directly connected to me.

  Still, every now and then, I couldn’t help but steal a glimpse of this world in action. Just to make sure that I’d made the right decision to avoid it.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, the employee of the month announcement is here!” The man who thought he was my boss, Evan Albright, stood atop a glass table at Pay Day Loan Holdings. He made millions every quarter by convincing people near poverty to take out small loans with high interest, yet he still couldn’t afford to figure out how to wear a decent suit.

  “I hope you’re as excited as I am, people!” He pushed his wire-framed glasses up onto his face as the rest of the team entered the room. “Are we ready?”

  I checked my watch and set the timer for seven minutes.

  “The employee of the month, the person who will receive the life changing four hundred-dollar bonus on their next quarterly check is…Peter Monroe!”

  The room erupted into applause. I remained still by the windows, running the numbers through my mind.

  “Mr. Monroe has tripled his sales and landed us new business clients which will truly help our bottom line.” He continued to talk. “As for the personal feedback, he’s been stellar there as well. A customer called our corporate line and said her grandmother was sick—said she needed a little extra time to pay her loan, and Mr. Monroe said hell no. Then he double charged her account!”

  Applause.

  “There was another customer who claimed that he was about to be evicted—which we all know isn’t our fault, and Mr. Monroe turned down his request for an extension. He got him to sign on for another short-term loan with an even higher interest rate. Not only that, but he got this customer’s entire family to sign up for separate loans as well!”

  Mr. Monroe smiled amidst another round of applause, and Mr. Albright encouraged the staff to cheer as loudly as they could.

  “I hope he’ll serve as an example for the rest of you this month and you’ll pursue the impossible, because it’s possible.” He clapped his hands. “Congratulations, Mr. Monroe. Now, back to work, everyone.”

  The employees started to leave the room, and I debated whether I wanted to give this man my parting words now or in his office.

  “Mr. Dawson?” He beat me to it. “Mr. Dawson?”

  “Yes?” I approached the glass table.

  “Can you stay behind a few seconds, so I can talk to you in private?”

  I nodded and waited until the last person left the room.

  “I was hoping that I would be able to announce that you were my employee of the month today,” he said. “Even though you’ve only been working here for a month and a half, you’ve made quite the impact. I was really impressed with how well-researched you are. In fact, that’s a huge part of why I hired you, but—”

  “But what?”

  “Well, lately you haven’t been yourself. You’re lacking the team spirit, and you’re lacking the drive. You’re also—for lack of a better word—sucking ass.”

  I raised my eyebrow.

  “Especially these last couple of days,” he said. “You went from being nice and approachable to brooding and cold. You were once the first associate to volunteer to work late hours, but now you’re leaving super early. Also, I don’t know why the hell you went and got tattoos all over your hands and on your goddamn neck, like you’re some type of wannabe crime boss, but you need to cover those things up the next time you step into my building.”

  I smiled, saying nothing.

  “Now,” he said. “I can only afford to keep the employees who give their all every day, so I’m willing to give you a chance to stay on board at the best hedge fund in the city. What do you think about that?”

  “I think…” I paused, wondered whether I should be a nice person about this or be myself.

  “Um, hello, Mr. Dawson?” He crossed his arms. “I can’t wait all day for you to respond. Time is money, and we do have more sales to make.”

  Myself it is... “I think your company is a festering shit hole that preys upon the poor, and I think your father is rolling around in his grave right now at the fact that you call this a hedge-fund company. I can guarantee that he’s more than disappointed with you and how disgustingly greedy you’ve become. I also think you have no idea how to be a real CEO.” I paused. “Then again, you are cheating on your wife with the college girl who brings you coffee, cheating your employees by more than seventy percent, and lying to all of your other rich friends about running a hedge fund instead of a pathetic payday loan company. Since being a CEO requires knowing how to be full of shit, maybe you do know how to be a real one.”

  His face paled and he looked as if he’d lost his soul.

  “Are you still impressed with my research, or do I need to tell you a little bit more about yourself?”

  He said nothing, he just stared at me.

  I shrugged and headed to the door. Pushing it open, I looked over my shoulder. “If it’s any consolation, I was already planning to make today my last day.”

  I walked through the offices, taking the elevator down to the garage.

  The moment I slid behind the wheel of my Jaguar, I sent my identical twin brother a text message.

  Me: Congratulations. You’re fired now.

  His name immediately crossed my screen via phone call.

  “Yes?” I answered.

  “Did he try to beg me to stay? Was he surprised?” His words rushed out like a river. “Never mind, don’t answer that. Thank you for taking another one for the team.”

  “Why don’t you ever submit a two weeks’ notice or simply stop showing up to these shitty jobs like a normal person?”

  “Because I have deep and severe closure issues.” There was a smile in his voice. “Don’t you remember our dear therapist saying that?”

  “I only remember you continuing to use it as an excuse.” I rolled my eyes as I pulled out of the parking garage. I heard one of my burner phones buzzing in the glove compartment and stopped the car. “Hold on a second.”

  Opening it, I rummaged through all seven
of them until I found the culprit. The one that was marked “work.”

  “Yes?” I answered.

  “Good morning, Mr. Anderson,” the soft sound of my lead employee’s voice came over the line. “I’m so sorry to bother you this early in the morning, but we have a few major problems.”

  “Tell me the biggest one.”

  “We’re almost sold out on VIP tables for New Year’s Eve, and Rio Warren is here right now wanting to buy four of them.”

  “Okay, and?”

  “It’s Rio Warren, sir.” She suddenly sounded softer. “As in, the rumored boss of the D’Amato mafia family…”

  No, he’s actually their ‘underboss’. I shrugged. “Is he willing to pay his money upfront?”

  “Yes, he um…He laid it all out in hundred dollar bills a few minutes ago.”

  “Is his money green?”

  “Yes, sir…”

  “Then this isn’t a problem at all,” I said. “Tell the bartender to take an extra bottle of Dom Perignon, on me, to Mr. Warren’s table, whenever he and his friends arrive this weekend.”

  “No offense, Mr. Anderson,” she said, her voice still wavering. “I don’t think our customers will appreciate partying with these type of people, sir. I also don’t think that the honorable man who sold you this club two years ago would appreciate you accepting money from—well, God knows where their money comes from. I’m begging you to reconsider.”

  I tapped my fingers against the steering wheel, mentally replaying her words—trying not to focus on the “these type of people” line.

  It was in rare moments like this when my two worlds nearly collided, the dark with the light, the halfway pure with the wickedly depraved. One wrong move in either direction could fuck it all up, and I’d been way too damn careful over the past nine years to risk making the wrong choice.

  “You’re right, Tiffany,” I said, trying to sound as convincing as possible. “A man like Rio Warren is not the type of person I want at Fahrenheit 900. I’ll turn him down face to face when I get there in fifteen minutes.”

  “Thank you very much, sir.”

  “You’re welcome. You can hang up now.”

  “Well, I still have a few more major problems I have to let you know about.”

  “I’ll let you know when I want to hear them.” I ended the call and tossed the phone into my glove compartment; I’d deal with her when I arrived at the club.

  Holding the other phone up to my ear, I heard my brother softly laughing.

  “Something funny, Trevor?”

  “Nothing at all,” he said. “Are you honestly going to tell Rio Warren that he’s not welcome?”

  “Hell, no.” I sped onto the street. “I’m going to offer him the top suite and let him use the hidden celebrity entrance.”

  “I would expect nothing less,” he said. “Two last things. One, I forwarded you the weekly updated list of sexual offenders and current city criminal defendants, and guess what?”

  “What?”

  “It’s the same as last week.” He scoffed. “Why you waste your time on this, I’ll never know.”

  “I’ll never tell you. What’s the other thing?”

  “I received some random ‘thank you for that’ bouquets at four of our other businesses today. Did you send more than my condolences to Liam Kline’s family after his funeral last year?”

  “I slept with his wife a few times.”

  “Figures. Speaking of which, have you ended your never-ending dry spell yet? Any new leads on Tinder?”

  Only one, but she shouldn’t even be an option... “Not yet. I’ll be sure to update my cock’s activity with you later, though.” I ended the call and turned off my phone. When I stopped at the next red light, I opened my glove box and put it away, pulling out two other ones that were marked ‘other work’ and ‘non-personal.’

  I turned on the ‘non-personal’ one and waited for the notifications to load. There were text messages from women I’d long stopped talking to and my former therapist, who I avoided at all costs. I muted all those threads and clicked on Tinder.

  Opening the app, I clicked on the premium tab, wanting to see if the only woman I’d swiped right on several times had finally liked me back. She hadn’t. Instead, she’d flagged me for a fucking fraud and tagged me to a comment where she was talking about me in the community forum.

  Seriously? Can someone else flag this asshole, so we can prevent him from getting some other woman’s hopes up? He keeps swiping right on me, popping up on my feed and I know he’s not real.

  I smiled and pulled up her pictures again. She was hands-down, the sexiest woman I’d ever seen. Dark brown curls framed her faintly freckled cheeks, her bow shaped lips were coated in a devilish shade of red in every photo, and her deep almond eyes were beyond alluring.

  She was the only woman who I’d been this attracted to at first sight, the only woman who could arouse me within a matter of seconds from a mere picture.

  Since she wanted to play games, I decided to return the favor. I clicked on the dots beside her name and flagged her account for fraud.

  Within seconds, she swiped right on me and sent me a message.

  GoodGirl1996: Look here, you fucking sock-puppet…I’m clearly not interested in you, and I know that’s hard to believe, but I prefer my men to be REAL, so do yourself a favor and find someone who’s willing to fall for your fake/stolen pics.

  I smiled and wrote her back.

  The Devil: What makes you think my pictures aren’t real?

  GoodGirl1996: Because if you were, you wouldn’t need to use this app at all.

  The Devil: In that case, I could say the same thing about you…

  GoodGirl1996: So, you think flattering me is going to work? *eye roll emoji*

  The Devil: If you’d like, I can come show you that I’m real right now.

  GoodGirl1996: Oh, I’m sure. *double eye roll emoji* I have a date with a REAL guy later this afternoon at The Brunch 7. Feel free to stop by and show yourself to the both of us.

  The Devil: I will. I’ll be there.

  GoodGirl1996: You’ll be there as some trolling prepubescent teenager who has way too much time on his hands. The moment Tinder determines that your complaint is full of it, I’m willing to bet that everyone in the community will have your account banned for life.

  The Devil: I wouldn’t waste my time on placing such a terrible bet with me, if I were you. I’ve never lost at anything in my life…

  She blocked me before I could say another word.

  Meredith

  Before

  MissCherry718: Soooo, I haven’t seen this guy’s profile on the site here yet (must have the wrong qualifications checked), but DAYUUUMM! I’ll happily take one for all of womankind if he messages me. I’ll find out if he’s real or not for you. LOL

  Escape9to5: Ugh. I don’t understand this girl’s complaint at all…Is she saying that hot guys are above using Tinder and “liking” her? Maybe she has some self-esteem issues. Can someone nominate her to be on Dr. Phil’s show or something?

  Autumn42: I’m with you Escape9to5! Like, ‘Oh, noooo…The horror of a sexy as fuck man swiping right on me several times!’ Maybe he’s really trying to get your attention? Maybe he’s THAT interested in you?

  MissCherry718: I can’t determine if she’s trying to “humble brag” about how much this guy wants her, or if she’s really this delusional.

  Escape 9to5: You guys, it’s neither. It’s just clear that she’s new to Tinder. That, and she needs to get fucked and get back in her right mind. Bahahaha!

  I groaned as I read over the latest responses on my public post. Within a week, the entire community had turned against me, and I was on the verge of deleting the post, but the sting of the truth was holding me back.

  “She needs to get fucked and get back in her right mind…”

  I was hoping that tonight’s date with the latest guy I’d met on Tinder would have that exact ending. We’d been messaging for the pa
st several days in a row—toeing the line between flirting and making it obvious that we both wanted to have sex. Granted, his dirty talk wasn’t the best I’d ever heard, but it was far from the worst.

  “Once I finger bang your pussy, you’ll never want to be finger-banged by another man again…”

  Opening my text messages, I opened the last one he’d sent.

  Bennett (HG456): Can’t wait to see you tonight at The Brunch 7, sexy girl.

  “Miss Thatchwood…” My boss cleared her throat, launching me back into reality where I was supposed to be working. “Has Ralph Lauren returned my messages about those grey suits? What about Jason Wu?”

  “Mr. Lauren is currently sitting in your office,” I said. “I talked him into stopping by for a late lunch once I saw that he was in town via Instagram.” I picked up a red binder and held it out for her. “Jason Wu sent this over an hour ago. I wanted to go through all the things I knew you’d hate before handing it over.”

  Her lips curved into a smile and she stared at me for several seconds. “I don’t normally say this, and I doubt I’ll ever say it again, but I’m very impressed with you, Miss Thatchwood. I honestly thought you wouldn’t last beyond a week, or that you would break down and return to your heiress-empire a lot sooner, but you might end up being one of the best assistants I’ve ever had.”

  Might? “I think I already am…”

  “No, not yet.” She shook her head. “Last another two years and I’ll make a decision on that.” She looked at her watch. “You can leave now. I don’t need you here any longer today.”

  I shut my laptop before she could change her mind. I grabbed my oversized bag and rushed to the closest bathroom, where I traded my blue button-down shirt and khakis for a simple beige lace dress. I swapped my silver toned flats for nude colored stilettos, and coated my plain pink lips in my preferred shade of sinful red.