Kevin quietly opened his office door just enough to peer out over his wire-rimmed glasses and view the entire floor. As he surveyed the scene in front of him, he caught a glimpse of Gabrielle as the elevator doors closed, and then noticed that the office was in complete silence as everyone stared in Olin’s direction, some with their mouths slightly ajar and others with them clamped tightly shut, but all with their eyes wide. Kevin followed their shocked gazes, veered his gaze over at Olin, and did his best to control the laughter that hung at the edge of his thin lips when he saw him.
Olin stood at Gabrielle’s desk like a stiff piece of wood, red faced and fuming. He looked so enraged that at any moment, Kevin expected to see sparks fly out of his fingertips or eyes, like something from a movie about evil warlocks or some creature from the depths of hell. For a brief moment, Kevin wished he had a camera to forever capture Olin’s expression, but that fleeting thought was quickly erased by Olin’s booming voice as he yelled at them all to get back to work.
Like a turtle that sought refuge in his shell, Kevin pulled his head back in and gently shut his door. There was no way of telling what exactly had happened, but obviously, if Gabrielle had just quit after Olin’s torrential outburst, then things on the twenty-third floor were about to get even more tense than they had already been. Kevin sighed deeply and thought, Just perfect. Right in the middle of tax season when we are at our busiest, and what does he do? He provides enough office fodder for everyone to talk about for weeks when what they need to be doing is working.
Kevin sat back down in his chair with a loud ‘thump” and looked out the window at the majestic mountain ranges that surrounded the city. A deep sigh escaped his lips as he remembered his younger days that he had spent carefree in Lake Tahoe in the small but comfortable house he grew up in, and he longed to be there again. No harsh time demands; no wife or children that constantly demanded money; no endless hours spent behind a computer screen crunching numbers for ridiculously rich, obnoxious assholes that insisted upon having their finances altered so their tax returns would show less wealth and bigger refunds. Just days full of warm sun, cool water, and plenty of fish to catch and fry.
Why he ever decided to become an accountant was beyond him. Understanding numbers, checks, balances and finances had interested him as a child, and Kevin had shown quite a knack for it. But, if he could have caught a glimpse of what his future was going to be like—working sometimes twenty-four hours a day, missing Easter holidays, birthdays, anniversaries, and rarely having any quality time for himself. He would have not killed himself so hard in college and just followed in his father’s footsteps and become a mechanic. True, he would have come home smelling like diesel, and his nails would be ruined from the oil and dirt, but at least he would be home with his family, unlike the life that Kevin had actually experienced. It didn’t really even matter now since his two children were both adults and out of the house already, one in her last year of college and the other married and living out of state. It was too late now to attempt to reinvent precious moments and memories, even if they were only in his head.
Kevin shook his head to rid himself of the reminiscences of what never could or would be. He did not have time to wander down that path today, as he had other things in his life that demanded his time, which now included this catastrophe between Olin and Gabrielle. He drew in a deep breath once again and tried to channel some energy from it because he certainly did not have any reserved to deal with another crisis since he was firmly embedded in the midst of his own.
He stared hard at the work that was piled up on his desk that he couldn’t concentrate on, as he had been nervously awaiting a phone call from the doctor’s office with the paternity test results. They told him at the clinic two weeks ago, when he went to give a sample of his DNA, that it would take up to two weeks for the results to come back, and the anticipation was driving him absolutely insane. If he was the father, how the hell was he going to tell his wife and grown children? What would happen to his beloved title of Boy Scout Group Leader when they found out he was an adulterer, one that spawned a love child? How would this affect his position in the firm? He buried his face in his hands and tried to shake the image of his sins fluttering down all around him and finally coming home to roost in his soul.
As with most partners at Winscott, Kevin wasn’t immune to playing the field. He remembered when he first started over twenty years ago as a young, fresh-faced newbie straight out of college how appalled he had been at the endless bed-hopping that went on between everyone, including all of the partners that had long since retired or died. Of course, being a tall, lanky nerd with not much to offer save for his fast mental calculations and unbelievable memory for names and numbers didn’t exactly entice the women to flock to him, so he enjoyed blissful ignorance for years, quietly slaving away countless hours behind a desk working on tax returns. It wasn’t until he made partner that the women around the office started to take notice of him, and when he became an equity partner, they really sat up and gave him more than just a glance.
Kevin knew that it wasn’t his thinning, combed-over gray hair, paunchy belly, or his wrinkly face with the deep brown eyes that attracted the women—it was his title of equity partner that they found appealing, for it meant he had some semblance of power over the direction of their careers. Six months after becoming an equity partner, Kevin was confronted with his first real test of moral fortitude when one of the tax seniors, Shauna, came sauntering into his office late one night wearing not much more than her coat and high heels. Straddling his desk, she told him she would give him the ride of his life in exchange for promotion to manager. Kevin failed that morality test miserably and discovered that Shauna had been right—it was the ride of his life—and she not only made manager, but eventually became a partner before she left to open her own successful firm in Flagstaff less than two years later. Shauna’s wild romp also opened his eyes to a new and exciting life that he never had thought possible for himself and one that he had been taught since he was a young boy to stay away from. He knew that he was sinning by committing adultery, but the cork on his bottled up life had been opened, and he couldn’t find a way to stop the flow of desire now.
Kevin soothed his guilty conscious by telling himself that he was just enjoying a good romp every now and then, unlike Olin, who screwed around for the sadistic enjoyment of demeaning someone or holding power over them. Kevin just played around because he enjoyed the sex and the companionship because God knew that he enjoyed neither of those two things at home.
He had been married for twenty-five years to a boorish attorney that kept even worse hours than he did and whose idea of passionate sex consisted of shaven legs and not wearing a t-shirt to bed every few weeks. It didn’t help that Kevin was surrounded by young, eager women who were more than willing to do anything to get to the top; this included climbing under the sheets with an aging partner. After the ice had been broken by Shauna—along with a wooden chair, if he recalled correctly—Kevin had bedded several of the ladies over the years, and each relationship had generally ended amicably when he made good on his promises for promotions, which freed up both parties to go their separate ways with no hard feelings. However, his dalliance with Miranda, which had ended over nine years ago, had come back to haunt him, as he secretly always envisioned that it would.
After their parting of ways when she was promoted to senior manager, Miranda no longer found him enticing since she’d gotten what she wanted, so they drifted apart. That was fine with Kevin, since he had grown a bit tired of her constant whining and complaining anyway. It wasn’t until she’d remarried this past year that his interest in her piqued again. He wasn’t entirely sure if his desire for her stemmed from the fact that she was off the market now or from the challenge he felt it would be to woo a married woman, but this time, Kevin found himself being the pursuer, rather than the one being pursued. He really didn’t care what was behind his motivation as he decided to test the waters again and
started discretely letting Miranda know he wanted to pick up where they had left off years before. An evocative email here and there, a lingering stare at the copier, leaning in closer when they talked, suggestively touching her as he walked past her in the hallway; he’d tried them all. To his surprise, Miranda had not responded to his flirtations, which he found a bit puzzling. Although short lived, their affair had been one of the most memorable he could recall, and she seemed to have enjoyed it as much as he had.
After one particularly stressful day three weeks ago, Kevin had imbibed in one too many drinks at his desk as he settled in for an all-nighter and began “sexting” Miranda. He had overheard several of the younger employees talk about doing it and decided that it sounded like fun and might appeal to Miranda, who was twenty years his junior. The only response he’d received from her that night was “tmr I’ve got sumthg 4 U,” and he thought, in his drunken stupor, that she wanted to give it to him on the couch in his office the next morning, as she had done so many times before. He had been so excited that he had meticulously groomed himself the next morning, making sure he looked and smelled his best.
Unfortunately, he had been completely off course about what Miranda planned on giving to him.
When Miranda showed up in his office and closed the door behind her, Kevin was thrilled and more than ready, only to be greeted by news that he had never expected to hear. Miranda politely but firmly told him that she was not interested in resuming their relationship as she sat down in the small chair in front of his desk. Kevin stood up and walked toward her, hoping a quick shoulder massage would change her mind; he recalled how a shoulder massage was what had started their affair years ago in the first place. He was stopped dead in mid-stride when she said, “I think Edward is yours, and I want a paternity test to prove it. If he in fact is yours, then I expect a substantial raise to cover child support, and to keep my silence.” All the color immediately drained from Kevin’s already pale, wrinkled face, and he froze where he stood.
“What?” was the only word Kevin could muster from his trembling lips as his hand instinctively rose to cover his heart, afraid that those horrendous words would cause a stroke or heart attack any second.
“I have already taken Edward in for the test at Mark’s request. I don’t know why, but I can only assume that as Edward grew and showed no familial resemblance whatsoever to Mark or any of his family that he grew suspicious, so he insisted upon the test. The results came back last week and to my surprise, Mark was right—he isn’t Edward’s father. If you recall, we had just started our, um, thing after Mark and I split, and before the papers were finalized, Mark and I had been together several times. Honestly, it never occurred to me that at your age, you could be the father, but you are the only other person I was with at the time,” Miranda said, looking directly at Kevin’s aging frame with a look of slight disgust and anger on her face. She shifted in her seat and cleared her throat as she continued.
“Since the clinic already has my DNA as well as Edward’s, all we need now is yours. If you don’t go willingly, I already have the papers ready to file with the court, compelling you to get the test; but of course, you know I don’t want to have to go through that extremely public route. I know how well-respected you are with the Scouts, and how much that means to you,” Miranda sneered as she almost spit out the last sentence.
“My marriage is falling apart, and James is ready to leave. He is sick and tired of the crazy hours that I put in here. You know as well as I do that I have to work these hours to keep my head afloat since that pit out there is a revolving fucking door of people,” Miranda said as she jerked her head in the direction of the lower level tax staff that sat in glass encased cubicles outside of Kevin’s office. No longer able to contain her nervous energy in just the chair, Miranda stood up and walked over to the window. “I have to have the extra income if I can’t convince James to stay since Mark will no longer be paying any child support. If Edward is yours, which I’m sure that he is, and if you want to keep your identity as his father a secret, we will, but only for a price,” Miranda said, turning her head to look over her shoulder so she could see Kevin’s reaction.
Kevin felt his heart race and knew his blood pressure was rising as his ears felt like a match had just been lit under them. He felt weak, and his vision dotted with bright spots, and it took him a full ten seconds to finally gain enough composure to make it back to his chair where he flopped awkwardly down, barely hitting the edge of the seat. Nauseated and disoriented, Kevin clasped his long, boney fingers around his head, avoiding Miranda’s impatient stare, as he contemplated pulling out the fifth of vodka he had stashed in his desk, guzzling the whole thing down, and then leaping out the window. The image of Miranda naked on his couch nine years ago, promising him he need not worry about a condom since her tubes had been tied, flashed through his head. Oh God, it was a possibility.
Kevin had been too stunned to offer up much in the way of protesting Miranda’s demands. Although he was gifted with managing complicated tax calculations, social skills and communicative abilities with others were characteristics that he sorely lacked, and when faced with difficult decisions, Kevin tended to regress into the deepest recesses of his mind to find the solution. This time was no different as he heard himself agreeing to take the test and promising Miranda that he would do whatever it took to keep things quiet as she scrawled the name of the clinic and doctor down on a piece of paper and handed it to him. Kevin had felt the tears welling in his eyes and had to avert his face toward the window as Miranda turned and walked out, and as she shut the door behind her, he couldn’t help but wonder if the proverbial door to his old life had just been slammed shut for good as well.
Now, here he was, two weeks later, a bundle of raw nerves that jumped every time the phone rang, waiting desperately to find out if his life had been forever altered due to his lack of moral fortitude. He silently prayed, asking God to forgive him for his sinful ways, and gave empty promises not to make the same mistakes ever again. The last thing he needed to add to his frazzled emotions was another Olin fiasco and huge financial payout. God, he wondered how much Gabrielle would cost the firm. Olin was out of control, and Kevin and all the other equity partners knew it; they just didn’t know how to go about stopping him without bringing the firm down along with him. So Kevin prayed that God would do something to stop the madness, since he felt utterly helpless to do so.
In the midst of Kevin’s half-hearted prayer attempts to persuade God to give him another chance, his email chimed with an incoming message. Unlike last time, Kevin didn’t jump as the blood froze in his veins while his body stuck firmly to his chair. The subject line stated that the results were in.
“HE SAID WHAT?” CARL blurted into his cell phone as he sat at a seemingly never ending red light, late to the office as usual after another night up with their newest addition to the family—a howling, “up all night” boxer puppy. Becoming a step-father again at forty-nine was not all he had thought it would be, and most likely, it was karma kicking him in the ass for his fourth marriage—this one to yet another assistant who was almost twenty years his junior and had a young son that insisted upon having a new dog.
“I swear that’s what he said! That she was ‘no good to anyone except to suck their dick and wasn’t any good at it anyway!’” his newest assistant, Renee, whispered into the phone as she sat at her desk, her back turned from everyone else as she relayed the morning’s events to Carl over the phone. “It was crazy! I thought Olin was going to have a stroke he was so mad! His face was the color of a ripe tomato fresh out of my mamma’s garden!” whispered Renee, her giggling stifled by her chubby little hand. Carl could just envision the look on her plump face as she had witnessed the ruckus in front of her today. Renee was a sheltered, small-town girl with a boring face and most likely had never felt the touch of a man’s hand between her hefty legs. Carl twisted out a cynical grin as he thought of his wife, Shelly, and her insistence that her replacement
be nothing to look at; in fact, she had pestered Carl to hire her friend, the competent yet overweight and average looking Renee. Shelly knew Carl had a habit of marrying his assistants, as he had previously done the prior two out of three marriages before her, and she wasn’t about to let there be a fifth wife.
“So what did Gabrielle say? Is she still there?” Carl questioned as he pulled into the parking deck. He stopped and then gazed longingly at the back seat, wishing he could climb back there and sleep for a few hours. The Starbucks he was chugging had yet to kick start his morning, and even though he really hated dealing with office drama, he felt a sick compulsion to hear the rest of the morning’s excitement.
“She left. She yanked her purse smooth off her desk and then just strutted right out. She didn’t even look at any of us or say goodbye or nothing! She whispered something to Olin before she left, but I couldn’t hear what she said. She got up, left all her stuff at her desk except her purse and walked out, just like that,” Renee said, snapping her fingers to prove her point. Carl was trying unsuccessfully to gather all his things together and make it out of the car without dropping everything as he replied, his breath a bit heavy, “I’m in the deck. Let me get up there, and then you can tell me the rest.” He flipped his phone shut before Renee had a chance to say anything in response. For a brief second his heart pounded when he couldn’t find his computer until he discovered it was buried under the piles of dog treats and paraphernalia in the back seat. Damn, he needed to clean out his car! No, better yet, he needed to just buy Shelly whatever new toy she wanted to drive so she would quit driving his beloved Beamer. He didn’t pay over $80,000 for a car to get dog hair and drool all over the floor and on his luxurious Nappa leather seats. Of course, when he had bought this car two years ago, he was still on wife number three and had no intention of ever having any more children since he felt that the three adult children he already had were plenty. Shelly’s little two-seater had been fine when it was just her and her son, Colt, but with the addition of the new puppy, there simply wasn’t enough room. He made a mental note to get Renee started on the car hunting project for Shelly as soon as he made it upstairs.
Eviscerating the Snake - The Complete Trilogy Page 4