by Emma York
I headed upstairs and then got on the phone. Marty picked up after six rings. That was something. He was still answering the phone.
“Where were you?” I asked, trying to keep my voice neutral. “We had a meeting this morning, remember?”
“I was busy gathering spiritual inspiration in the woods."
“Couldn’t have gathered it yesterday?”
He laughed, a relaxed happy laugh that made me grip the phone so tightly it creaked in my hand. “The muse is fickle, Bill. You should know that. I have to tempt her out. I can’t force her.”
“Couldn’t tempt her a bit quicker? Have you got a manuscript ready for me, Marty?”
“Bill, Bill, Bill.” More laughter. “You should learn to relax. You’ll have a heart attack.”
I thought about Andy, lying in his hospital bed. I said nothing.
“Creativity isn’t beholden to deadlines and schedules,” Marty continued. “It can’t be pigeon holed. You have to work with it, not against it. The pressure of a deadline is the pressure to fail. I want to succeed, Bill. I want my book, my baby, to succeed. I want its birth to be natural, not forced. Don’t you?”
“It’s a book, Marty,” I said. “Not a child. You agreed to this deadline. You miss it and we're out.”
That was when she walked in. I glanced up when the doors hit the walls, seeing a flash of a sparkling bright face that held my attention. Then the face was gone, smacked by the two returning doors.
“You want the best,” Marty was still talking. “You have to let the best come organically, not spray it with chemicals. It’ll wither and die if you do that. Toxic for the soul and the book.”
It was hard to hear him. Lucy was through the doors again, shouting at the room, telling everyone to pay attention. I ignored her. I needed Marty to realise how serious this was. “You missed the deadline, Marty. If I don’t have a manuscript by the end of today, I’m going with another book. Do you understand? I want the book. Tell me you have it ready.”
“In a way.”
“Be honest with me. Just tell me the truth one time. Is it ready?”
“Well, I have-”
A shadow fell over me and the line went dead in the same moment. I looked up. Lucy was standing there, her finger on the bright red disconnect button. “I said everyone needs to pay attention,” she said at the top of her voice. “That includes you.”
I looked at the phone and then up at her. She had hung up the phone when I was in the middle of getting the most important author to admit what was going on with the most important book of the summer release schedule. Not only that but she had hung up the phone of the man in charge of Snow Day Publishing. Her boss. She had no idea what she'd just done. I went from wanting to fuck her to wanting to spank the hell out of her.
“I’m in charge around here,” she continued, spinning around and prowling across the floor, glancing from one person to the next. “If I say do something, you do it. If I say listen, you listen. I don’t care how it was around here before. We’re going to turn this entire company around and that starts right here in adult fiction."
She pointed at me before continuing. "It’s all change and I’m going to get us back in profit and you’re going to help, not by staying on the phone when I'm talking. To make money, we all need to work harder than we’ve ever worked before. That means paying attention when I tell you to listen. It means hanging up the phone when I tell you to. I wasn’t hired to be your friend, I was hired to be in charge. And, by the way, whoever parked in my parking space will soon find out what it means to mess with the woman in charge.”
“I parked in your space,” I said, bringing her attention back to me.
“You again,” she said, eyes narrowing as she glared at me. “I’ll deal with you later.”
She stormed over to her office, closing the door and dumping her bag on the desk. I had to resist smiling. She looked good. She’d look even better bent over that desk with me spanking that mean streak out of her.
I got back on the phone. “Hi, Marty. Sorry about that. No, don’t talk. Listen. You have until the end of this week to get a complete manuscript to me. No first draft, no treatment for a film. No synopsis. A complete manuscript. If it is not on my desk by next Monday with the words The End on the final page, the contract is dead and we’ll be clawing the advance back from you.”
He said something but I didn’t hear it. I had glanced up and seen Lucy standing in her office, facing the front of the glass window, her arms folded. She was looking directly at me. I couldn’t look away. It was her eyes. I was caught in them.
She blinked, as if coming to. Then she tapped on the glass, pointing directly at me. “Get back to work,” she mouthed.
I turned away, tuning back into Marty preaching about the need for his muse to have the right musical and visual aura for him to produce his best work, how the suits could never understand true creative genius.
None of that mattered. The deadline was set. The end of the week. That gave me time to talk to the lawyers and work out how to end the contract without it costing more than letting him keep the obscenely large advance Sandra had given him. There would also be the small task of finding another book for the summer push. But that was for later.
For now I needed to not look at Lucy in her office. Because when I did, I wanted to tell her who was really in charge. I wanted to punish her for hanging up my phone, for talking to me like that. I wanted to yank that skirt of hers up and…
I smiled as I wondered how she’d react when she found out who I really was, who she's spoken to so fiercely.
“The end of the week,” I said to Marty, hanging up the phone before getting to my feet and walking out of the office. I needed to have a meeting with the lawyers. Find out exactly what had gone into Marty’s contract, how we could get out of it. I didn’t look back. I knew if I did, I might get stuck in her gaze again. Then I wouldn’t be able to think about anything else but her and how much I wanted to discipline her.
THREE - LUCY
I wanted to discipline him in front of everyone. I wanted to take Anna’s advice, single someone out and do it. I really did. It would have been the perfect start.
He ruined it.
Well, the doors didn’t help and that was before I even got to him.
I had gone for the power move. I shoved the doors open, wanting to make a memorable first impression.
It was definitely memorable but for all the wrong reasons. The doors hit the walls either side and bounced straight back, smacking me in the face.
I staggered backwards, thinking my nose was definitely broken. It wasn’t but it would be swollen and hard to breathe through for the next few hours. The whole office began laughing at me. I could hear them through the closed doors. I almost turned and ran. I thought of the food club, how it would feel to tell our clients we were closing down. Somehow, I moved forwards, pushing the doors gentler this time, then marching in, needing to get back on track.
As soon as I was inside, I yelled at the top of my voice. “Everyone, stop what you’re doing and listen to me.” I sounded horribly nasal, my swollen nose impeding the dramatic effect I was going for. "Off the phones, face this way."
Surprisingly, they all looked at me. It was working. No, not all of them. One man in the middle of the room was still on the phone. He took a single glance at me before returning to the call. He looked good but he was infuriating, ignoring me like that.
“My name is Lucy Rhodes and I am your new boss.”
He was still on the phone. Perfect. There was the ideal chance to show everyone who was boss. Get in his face, maybe fire him on the spot for such insolence in the face of authority. A bit much. I’d give him a thorough dressing down instead.
So I marched over to his desk while everyone watched. He was facing the other way, continuing to talk. I saw the red button on his desk phone so I pressed it, knowing I was doing the right thing. In that one act, they would all see I was the boss. There was a gasp when I di
d it. That's right, I thought, mega-bitch is in charge.
Then he looked at me. I no longer wanted to give him a dressing down. I just wanted to undress him.
I felt like I’d gone back in time about a hundred years. No, longer. Five hundred. The trappings of being in charge fell away like my clothes, leaving me naked in his gaze. He was a King, me a wilting servant or captured bride. He owned me in that glance. I was trapped in his eyes. I couldn’t escape.
It all happened in a brief second and then it went. I came back to myself. I opened my mouth but I had completely forgotten what I was going to say.
I spun around, my mind coming back to me as I walked around the office, words coming out of my mouth without me knowing what they were. They all listened. That was what mattered. I was fine as long as I didn’t look at him. I hated the way he’d made me feel.
I was doing absolutely fine until he’d looked at me.
I was his boss but I almost apologised as if he was in charge. There was an aura of authority to him and it was hard to ignore. He had looked so angry with me for hanging up his call and I’d instantly felt bad for doing it.
I was in charge. This was Anna crying all over again. My facade mustn’t crumble that easily. I knew what to do to get it back. Find out who’d parked in my spot, take my anger out on them. A second chance to show how things were going to be with me in charge.
So I built up to it. I planned to take my time, tell them exactly what would happen to whoever took my spot. Only then would I ask who had done it.
Then a voice behind me admitted to doing it before I’d even had a chance to get going.
I spun around and it was him. Again.
My heart fluttered when I looked at him. He was sitting there, relaxed as anything. Everyone else was on edge, nervously listening to my speech. But he looked more amused with me than stressed.
“I’ll deal with you later,” I said because it was all I could get out. Then I ran for my office.
I thought I could hide in there but the wall facing the main office space wasn’t a wall, it was a window, a window that gave me no privacy at all.
It had clearly been designed so the boss could watch the staff at work but it meant I couldn’t relax. I couldn’t put my head in my hands and cringe, I couldn’t feel my nose to see how much damage had been done, how bad it looked. All I could do was fix an angry expression on my face and wait for them all to get back to work. Then I could go hide in the ladies room and scream into my handbag, maybe slap myself across the face, get back on track as mega-bitch boss.
I looked out at them all, glaring as best I could. And who was looking right at me? Him, like he knew I wanted to strip for him. What was he doing? Trying to undermine me? It was awful, it felt like he was the only one who already knew the truth, that I wasn’t mega-bitch, that I was winging it completely.
There was no way I was giving in to my desire. It was a sure fire way to lose the job before the trial even began.
“Get back to work,” I mouthed, watching him turn away. At least he was doing as he was told. That was something.
I watched his back. Whatever the call was, it was making him tense. I wanted to massage those shoulders, remove that tension. No I didn’t. I was mega-bitch.
When the call ended, he got up and walked away.
I was still looking out when there came a knock on my door. I hadn’t even noticed anyone approaching. “Come in,” I said, turning and moving behind the desk, switching on the computer as a woman walked in, file hugged tightly in her arms. “Hi,” she said. “How are you settling in?”
“What do you want?” I asked. Was that too cruel? Too brusque?
Mega-bitch. Think mega-bitch.
“Sorry, right, yes. I’ve got your schedule for the next few months here. If you want a hand going through it, just let me know. I’m Ellie by the way.”
“Leave it on the desk, thanks so much.” Would mega-bitch say thanks? Oh well, too late, it was out there.
She turned and headed to the door. I opened the file. It had been divided into sections. There was my personal schedule, the meetings that had been set up, the deadlines I was supposed to supervise. Then there was a section of book releases including a TBC for August with a big red circle around it. I picked up a pen and drew a question mark. I needed to know why the book wasn’t noted down. There was TBC with build up promo points on earlier days too. What was that book?
Getting through the rest of the file took most of the day. Luckily, whenever I looked up, the man who’d been watching me wasn’t there. I wondered if I could be brave enough to discipline him. Wandering off from the office for hours on end. I wanted to know where he had gone. It definitely wasn’t because I wanted to look in those ocean blue eyes of his again. It wasn’t because I wanted to stare at his jutting firm jaw, those cheekbones, that hint of stubble. None of that. I just wanted to know where one of my employees had wandered off to.
It was nearly five when he reappeared, not that I was keeping track of time. I was too busy dealing with the file.
He reappeared at his desk at the same time as Ellie came back to my door. She knocked loudly.
“Come in,” I said, turning the file back to the calendar page. “What’s this TBC here?”
“That one? I think Bill’s dealing with that one himself. You know, Marty Berghaus?”
I knew about Marty Berghaus. Notorious flake. Was that who they were betting the house on for the summer big hit? Really? "Who cleared that idea?"
"Bill did."
“Who’s Bill?”
“Out there,” she said, nodding towards his desk. “The one who stole your parking space. He’s-”
“I don’t care who he is. I care about this TBC.”
“I’ll send him in, shall I?”
I wanted to tell her not to but there was no way of doing it without looking weak, the last thing I wanted apart from being alone with him. I didn't know what would happen if he came in.
She stood there looking at me. She looked frightened. Maybe mega-bitch was working after all.
“What? What is it?”
“I’m so sorry, Miss Rhodes. I forgot to put this conference in your schedule.” She waved a print out at me.
“Conference? What conference?”
“It’s this Friday. I only found out when I got into Sandra’s diary on the computer. I wasn’t allowed at first, you see.”
“Sandra?”
“The woman who had your job before you. She was supposed to be going to this conference and now you’re going to have to go instead.”
“I don’t have to do anything, Ellie. Why’s this conference so important anyway?”
“It’s not normally but we found out some of the big hitters from the American and Chinese markets are going to be there.”
“I get it.” I understood at once. A chance to network with the international markets and schmooze some agents and authors. “You’re giving me less than a week’s notice of something that important?”
“Well, you only started today.”
“That’s not the point. How am I supposed to prepare for something so big in five days?”
“Well, Sandra used to take an assistant with her to take notes and do the running around. Tim Bishop’s really good. Or she sometimes used Mary Flanagan.”
I looked out of the window at the roomful of people. So I could take an assistant with me? Make them do the running around? Who should I pick?
Bill was still sat smirking at me. “I’ll choose my own assistant,” I said.
“Of course, Miss Rhodes.”
She scurried out and I watched her cross the floor, leaning down to talk to Bill when she got to his desk. I thought his smirk might fade but it was still there when he got up and walked over. He pushed open my door without knocking.
“You wanted to see me?” he asked, walking in and taking the seat opposite mine.
He was infuriating. Hot as hell but still infuriating, acting like he owned the bloody pla
ce.
“You’re coming with me to the conference this weekend.” The words were out before I knew I’d said them. He just made me so angry, I couldn’t think straight.
If he was surprised he didn’t show it. “What if I’m busy?”
“Am I your boss or not?”
His smirk broadened and he looked like he was about to make a smart comment but then thought better of it. Apparently, you are,” he said at last.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all.”
“You’ll be at the hotel for six on Friday so we can run through the schedule before it all starts.”
“Sounds good to me.”
“Go on then. Off you go.”
I waved him away. I had planned to talk in detail about the TBC in the calendar but I needed him gone. The heat in the office seemed to have gone up twenty degrees while he’d been sat there. The air had all been sucked out too, leaving me like a dying fish on dry land, gasping for oxygen and unable to think about anything but survival.
I could only breathe when he was gone. My hands stopped shaking eventually. What was it about him?
I was infuriated by his nonchalant manner, by the hint of arrogance in his body language. Most of all I was terrified he knew the real me wasn’t a mega-bitch. The real me wanted to bend over my desk and let him slide his hand up the back of my skirt and…
I needed to concentrate.
Once he was back at his desk, I picked up my phone. It took several attempts to get it to work properly. I spoke briefly to a cleaner, then security in another building and then finally managed to get hold of Ellie to call her back in. “This conference,” I said when she appeared.
“Yes, Miss Rhodes?”
“Where is it?”
“Harrogate, at the conference centre.”
“Imaginative name for the place.”
“There’s a hotel directly above it and a lot of the agents and authors meet there.”
I was surprised. It wasn’t a conference I had heard about. But then most of the big hitters stuck to London. It had been a long time since I’d travelled north for something like this.