by Camy Tang
Gerry waved her out. “I’ll call Drake.”
Venus hustled down the hallway, trying to keep her computer bag from slipping from her shoulder. “Jaye, I need help. Our server is down.”
“Venus…I’m in L.A.”
“What?”
“Last-minute trip. Manager told me yesterday. Left last night.”
She kicked open her office door and dumped her bags on the floor. “Well…what are you doing now?”
“In traffic. Talking to animators in an hour.”
“Okay, I’m going to have Lisa call you.”
“Now?”
“I need the server up. Talk her through it.”
“Sure. ’Cause, you know, it’s really easy to fix something you can’t see.”
“Just do something. It’s not like I have a ton of options.”
“Okay, okay.” He clicked off.
Venus speed-dialed Lisa and gave her Jaye’s cell phone number while she booted up her computer. No emails from Esme. Rats. The latest version of the presentation she had was the one Esme sent on Friday. They’d worked on a new version yesterday, and Esme had promised to email a copy to her—but apparently she’d had other things on her mind, like quitting and leaving them hanging out to dry. She’d have to get it off Esme’s computer.
She swept into Esme’s office. The pink stuffed bears were gone from her desk. A wave like an electric field passed through her, making her shiver and her stomach cramp. As she clenched her midriff, she fisted her hands, fighting a sudden desire to rip the stuffing out of those dratted bears if they were still here. And the computer was still on. She toggled the mouse to disrupt the screensaver.
Gone. Wiped clean of every piece of data that wasn’t an application.
Venus collapsed into the chair, her stomach vibrating like a truck engine about to blow. This was deliberate. It must have taken Esme at least an hour. She knew Venus would need that presentation, and she’d purposefully destroyed it.
Venus said a few not very nice words.
Gerry had mentioned sabotage of the server. It was starting to sound more plausible by the minute. Was it connected to her laptop too? That bitter coffee, waking up as if she had a hangover… She opened their Instant Messaging application and sent Gerry an IM:
Esme’s hard drive is completely erased.
What do u mean erased?
She erased the presentation too.
Can u redo?
Yes. She hoped so. Did Esme or Macy have anything against Bananaville? You? Drake?
I’ll ask. On the phone w/ Drake.
While waiting, Venus looked to see if she could recover anything from the hard drive. The vibrating in her stomach had moved to her hands, and she found it hard to type.
Running feet down the hall. Stopping, starting again. “Venus! There you are!” Darla grabbed onto the doorframe to stop herself before she ran past. She looked frantic enough to combust, but she seemed to be trying to keep her voice down.
Oh. Man. “What is it?”
“It’s Amity!” Darla started to hyperventilate. “They’ve arrived early!”
TWENTY-SIX
What do you mean, she quit?” In the confines of the car, Drake’s voice sounded like a roar.
“Drake,” his mother admonished from the passenger seat.
“This morning.” Gerry sounded close to tears.
“Did she say why?”
“No. None of us suspected anything.”
“Well, Venus can do the presentation.” Even though she was horrible at them. He’d actually been relieved when he heard Esme was going to do it instead.
“She’s preparing right now. But Drake, what’s even worse is that Macy crashed the server last night.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Lisa’s been here since four trying to fix it. She says it looks deliberate.”
“Why would Macy do that?”
“I don’t know. But with Esme quitting…”
And he was too far away to turn back. They’d started at four thirty this morning and were just past Chico. He glanced at his mother. Not that he could turn back—she couldn’t miss her own sister’s funeral.
She gave him a troubled look. “I’m sorry.”
“Not your fault, Ma.” He said it automatically, but his hands clenched the steering wheel. Breathe deep. Calm down.
Gerry gasped. “Esme erased her computer. The entire hard drive.”
A programmer could not do that by accident. “That has to be deliberate.”
“Venus just IM’d me. Esme erased the presentation.”
Oh, no. Venus was bad enough at presenting when she was prepared. “Can she redo it?”
“She says yes. She asks if Esme or Macy had anything against us.”
He barely knew Macy, aside from the fact she was Esme’s friend and Venus had hired her. But Esme…would she really do this just because he’d turned aside her interest in him? She’d seemed to take their talk last night rather well. It seemed so petty. It didn’t seem like her, but then again, he was realizing he didn’t know her well at all.
“Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh!”
“What?” Drake pushed his Bluetooth headset closer.
“Amity is here early! Gotta go.” Gerry clicked off.
Early. They were early. He stared at the stretch of highway, empty and desolate. His mind felt the same way. He couldn’t believe it. Venus wouldn’t have time to prepare. They wouldn’t be able to do a demo because the server was down. And he was a hundred miles away. He slammed his palm into the steering wheel.
“Drake,” his mother breathed.
“Sorry, Ma.” Automatic.
He had never felt so helpless in his life.
Breathe. He breathed. He couldn’t do anything else. Breathe.
He remembered the song from church that Sunday. This is the air I breathe… He’d been going to church because Gerry asked him. It seemed to have calmed her, and he wanted to please her, so he went. Same with the youth group—she’d wanted him to, so he’d done it.
Pastor Lester’s sermons were okay. The worship music was okay. The people there were nice, although most of them had the typical Asian shyness and restraint.
But somehow it had all wormed its way inside him. He wasn’t even sure what. Suddenly it didn’t seem so impossible that there could be a God. That He’d care about the mess happening right now.
Breathe.
For the first time in his life, he prayed.
Venus exited the deathly silent meeting room, hounded by Gerry’s silently howling gaze. As she closed the door, she heard one of Amity’s VPs mutter, “Boy, Yardley was right about her.”
Yardley.
She froze right outside the meeting room door. Everything that had happened—her laptop, Esme erasing the presentation, Macy sabotaging the server—had been bent on embarrassing and ruining her. Not Bananaville, not Gerry or Drake. Venus. Only one person in the world hated her that much, and that was Yardley.
She’d have time to think more about it later. Right now, she had to see if Jaye had helped Lisa fix the server. But she couldn’t stop the ice water from running through her limbs, chilling her heart.
Yardley. Yardley had done all this to her.
It wasn’t entirely his fault. She should have been watching Macy more closely—a quick chat with Lisa had revealed Macy had been slacking off since she started, and to the rest of the team, she hadn’t seemed as experienced as she was supposed to be. They talked to Esme, who allayed their fears enough that they’d put off talking to Venus.
Apparently the entire website team was a little afraid of Venus.
She sighed.
Venus should have insisted on Esme sending her a recent copy of the presentation. Should have called her back to work to send it or asked for her password to get it off her computer herself.
But she hadn’t. She’d been so caught up in petty things like almost kissing Drake, she hadn’t paid enough attention. She’d neglected her work
at Bananaville, she’d been careless about her laptop.
A chasm had opened in her heart, yawning, empty, aching. It sliced deep within her. It cut through her organs, her muscles, her bones.
And Esme, one of the few people she’d allowed close to her, had done this.
The hammer fell three days later.
“Venus. Won’t like this.”
“Spit it out, Jaye.” Venus shouldered the phone, clicked on her mouse, and closed the file she’d been looking at. Almost time to leave work.
“Esme is new Game Lead for the Tortufa project.”
“What? At Oomvid?” She was glad she was sitting. Her legs had turned into the fatty, creamy almond Jell-O her Aunty Linda made.
Really, she shouldn’t be surprised. She’d turned everything around in her head, and she couldn’t see how Yardley hadn’t been involved somehow. Esme’s working at Oomvid—and as Game Lead, no less—just confirmed all her theories. “Yardley brought her in?”
“According to the grapevine.”
Venus thought, but didn’t say, some more not very nice words.
“Something else.”
She already knew. “The Spiderweb?”
“Pete let me see a brand-new development tool they started work on.”
Her gut ached. The acid in her stomach had been terrible for three days. “Is it ours?”
“Close. Not exactly. Won’t infringe on the patent.”
“Maybe they came up with it themselves.”
After a long pause, Jaye replied, “Don’t be stupid, Venus.” He hung up.
The Spiderweb was his too. And now they both had nothing.
Esme had stolen it. Had been working for Yardley and waited until Venus brought her laptop to work. Venus had only done that a handful of times—but Esme had only needed her to bring it that last time.
Deceitful. But why had she erased the presentation? Why had Macy crashed the server? Much as Yardley hated Venus, would they really do something so malicious just because he wanted them to?
Somehow she knew it had been personal, at least on Esme’s side.
And Venus intended to find out why.
The longer Venus waited for Esme to come home, the more creative she got in what she’d do to Esme when she finally saw her.
Esme’s apartment complex looked a lot like Venus’s condo—probably the same developer—but sat in a not-as-nice area of San Jose. Venus had parked near the apartment so she could keep an eye on her car.
Where was Esme? And Venus thought she stayed at work late.
Her cell phone rang. Drake. “What?”
“Where are you?” He sounded cautious—that voice people used when trying to placate a psycho.
“I’m waiting outside Esme’s apartment door. Her welcome mat is filthy, by the way.”
She thought she heard him groan faintly. “I just heard the news.”
“She stole the Spiderweb.”
“I heard about that too.”
“Well, then, why are you calling?”
“What do you think you can do?”
Venus smiled grimly “I have a lot of good ideas.”
“Venus.”
“She’s not home yet, anyway.”
“Just don’t do anything stupid.”
“I never do anything stupid.” But she was starting to feel stupid. She clicked the phone shut.
Maybe Esme’s zeal for her new position kept her after hours. Or maybe she had a hot date. Or maybe she’d come home already, despite Venus’s vigilance in watching for her car. Maybe she’d seen and recognized Venus’s convertible and made a quick getaway.
Drake was right. This was stupid. It had been dumb to even think she could catch Esme at her home. She’d just started a new, high-stress job that would probably demand sixteen-hour days from her for a few weeks, at least. Was Venus really willing to wait until midnight for her?
That would be a no.
She slunk down the apartment steps like a thwarted thief, cloaked in darkness and embarrassment. The burning under her breastbone just made it worse. It was one thing to want to deliver a slap to Esme, quite another when she deserved a good wallop herself. And one slap deferred didn’t make the other one less mortifying.
She stepped out onto the street just as a sleek new silver Mercedes convertible slid past.
With Esme behind the wheel.
They saw each other at the same moment. Esme gunned her engine.
The street into the apartment complex dead-ended about five hundred yards down. It was also too narrow for her to pull around. She’d have to find a parking stall in order to pull in and do a three-point turn.
Venus raced to her Beamer, slamming her thumb on the button for her remote engine start. Her cousin would get a kick out of this. Originally when he’d convinced her to install the after-market feature in her upgraded security system, it had been intended to open her windows, start her engine, and turn on her A/C before she got to her Beamer oven on hot California summer days. Not in a race to beat a dashing Mercedes.
Thanks to the lateness of the hour, all the parking stalls near her apartment were filled, so Esme had to go down quite a ways before she could pull into an empty one and then jam out of it, headed back down the street. She was already roaring toward her when Venus got in her car.
Venus hesitated only a fraction of a second. This was a lot worse than a slap.
But Esme deserved it.
Venus threw the car into gear and backed out with a rush of squealing tires.
Shrieking brakes that seemed to go on forever. Then bam! Venus’s car hopped sideways on impact. Her airbags erupted and slapped her with hard white hands. Ow!
Shrieking brakes that seemed to go on forever. Then bam! Venus’s car hopped sideways on impact. Her airbags erupted and slapped her with hard white hands. Ow!
All was silent for a long moment, which was nice because she needed time to make sure she was still breathing.
What had she done? She ached from the top of her head down through her spine. Rubbing the crown of her head, she wondered if she’d hit the ceiling. Good thing it was convertible cloth. Her chiropractor was going to kill her.
Oh, man. She took another deep breath. Maybe she shouldn’t have done that. At least, not with her seatbelt off.
She reached over to open the passenger side door, then dribbled out of the car. She glanced at her front end. Luckily, she’d cleared the other cars parked on either side of her, so she hadn’t dinged any of them.
She could walk at least. The airbags had hurt worse than the impact. She wandered around the car to the driver side door just as Esme’s car door swung open.
Hmph. Not bad, considering. The damage to her door didn’t look as bad as Esme’s dramatically crumpled front end. She guessed Esme had been farther away than she’d thought when she first backed out in front of her.
“Are you crazy?” Esme had finally found her voice. She stumbled out of her car, eyes glued to the ruffled metal, mouth swinging open. Venus had never seen Esme completely unhinged, and the sight entertained her way too much.
Her horrified gaze rose to Venus, who could feel the smile pulling at her mouth. The sight of the unfortunate Mercedes gave her more satisfaction by the second. “New car? Bought it with your signing bonus, huh?”
Esme gave an inarticulate sound of rage and took a step toward her. Venus did a Billy Blanks and brought her fists up. “I wouldn’t if I were you.” She had a good ten inches and at least twenty pounds on Esme’s tiny frame, never mind that her only kickboxing experience was TaeBo Boot Camp DVDs.
Esme stopped, although she stood there fuming and flinging her arms around. “Why did you do this?”
“Why do you think I did this?”
“You’re just jealous!” Esme stabbed her finger at Venus like a woodpecker at a tree trunk. “You can’t stand the fact I’ve got the job you wanted!”
“If I’d wanted the job, I wouldn’t have quit.”
“You were stupid enoug
h to quit Oomvid!” Esme screeched so loud that her voice cracked. “You don’t deserve this job!”
“Yardley didn’t offer me that job.”
She stopped mid-breath. “What do you mean?”
“He offered me VP of Programming, you twit.”
Esme’s pouty bottom lip dropped full open. Her face darkened, and she trembled like a bowl of chili about to erupt in the microwave. “I can do any job you can do! I would have been a better CTO than you are!”
Ah. That was it. She’d finally dug out the root of her animosity. “Drake would have promoted you to CTO if he thought you were competent.” It was true. Drake didn’t play favorites when it came to his team. Venus had known that about him before, and she had seen that in him during the last few months.
“Competent? Ha! He just wanted to get into your pants.”
Rather than your pants. But the girl might go ballistic if she said that, so Venus kept her mouth shut in a rare moment of tact. Drake had somehow told Esme he wasn’t interested, whereas he’d been quite clear to Venus that he was more than interested. She felt rather warm and fuzzy about that.
Esme’s attention returned to her car. She kicked at a tire. “You’re insane!”
Venus crossed her arms. “You lose your sanity when your Operations Manager sabotages your company and steals your proprietary software.”
Esme stilled. Her mouth twisted into an evil smile. “Prove it.”
Venus frowned. Her sparkling apple-cider feeling at the destruction of Esme’s personal property suddenly fizzled. She couldn’t prove it. And the injustice of everything overshadowed this petty bit of revenge.
Make that an expensive bit of revenge. Venus, you have reached an all-time low.
Suddenly, headlights turned the corner into the parking lot. Oh, great. They were blocking the entire street and had to call tow trucks right away. Good thing one of her cousins owned a body shop and another cousin was her insurance agent. She left Esme weeping with her head on her door frame while Venus climbed into her passenger door to get her purse and her cell phone.
The headlights approached them and stopped. Why had the car turned toward them? Couldn’t the driver see that he couldn’t get through?