“They’re friends of Jim’s,” Connie explained, referring to her financial whiz husband. “That way, Jim and I can come along, and the guys will all know each other like we all know each other. It’ll be fun.”
It sounded like dating in junior high to me, but I kept my mouth shut. At least this way I’d still have someone to talk to, even if the date bombed.
Before Marcia had a chance to react, the waiter appeared with a tray of drinks. “We haven’t ordered another round yet,” Gemma protested.
“These are compliments of that gentleman over there,” the waiter said as he set the drinks in front of us. We all turned to see a man sitting by himself at another table on the sidewalk. I almost fell out of my chair, for it was Slick from the subway.
I turned back to my friends, who were practically drooling on the table, even Connie, the married one. “Well, hello,” Gemma murmured, crossing her long legs so her miniskirt crept a little higher. Marcia leaned forward against the table, enhancing her cleavage. Connie smiled and played with her hair. I looked back at him, but he was just as oily as I remembered from the subway. There was obviously something I wasn’t getting.
I leaned closer to the others and whispered, “Is he someone I should know?”
“Why do you ask?” Marcia asked, not taking her eyes off Slick.
“Because y’all are staring at him like he’s Johnny Depp.”
“Mmm, Johnny Depp would be an accurate comparison,” Gemma said. “You don’t think it is Johnny Depp, do you?”
“Doesn’t he live in Paris?” Connie asked.
I looked back at the guy, just to make sure I wasn’t crazy, but it looked like I wasn’t the one with mental health issues here. “Are you crazy?” I asked. “He doesn’t look anything like Johnny Depp, not even when he gets all icky-looking for a role.”
“Honey, you need your eyes checked,” Gemma said.
I really did not get the appeal of this guy, who’d had the women on the subway and now my friends falling at his feet. I also didn’t like the idea of him just happening to show up where I was having dinner. New York might be small geographically speaking, but there are thousands of restaurants, and the odds of him just happening to choose this one were slim. Oh goody, my first stalker. If one of the men on the subway was going to follow me, why couldn’t it be the cute one?
I leaned forward again and whispered, “I think maybe he’s following me. He was sitting next to me on the subway this morning.”
“You lucky thing,” Marcia purred. “If you don’t want him, can I have him?” She winked at him and licked her lips.
“Oh look, he’s coming over here!” Connie squeaked. They all set about arranging themselves attractively as he approached.
“Good evening, ladies,” he said in the same oily voice he’d used with me on the subway. “Are you enjoying your drinks?”
They lost all pretense of New York sophistication as they dissolved in giggles. I just crossed my arms over my chest and raised an eyebrow.
He studied me intently, then, with his eyes still on me, said, “My name’s Rod Gwaltney.”
That was the name on the job offer e-mail. I was too stunned to respond. Fortunately—or not—Gemma was still on the ball. “I’m Gemma, and this is Marcia, Connie, and Katie.”
“Pleased to meet you,” he said.
I still couldn’t respond. Now I was absolutely sure this wasn’t a coincidence. But which had come first, the following or the job offer? Had he already been following me when I saw him on the train? Now I was even more sure that the offer was a scam. I’d never heard of stalking used as a job recruitment tactic. He probably ran some kind of sex slavery ring, but it had to be a pretty low-rent ring if they were resorting to someone like me, unless they specialized in procuring women for men with unhealthy girl-next-door fantasies.
While I’d been lost in shock, my friends were busy chatting flirtatiously with him. “It’s been nice meeting you ladies,” he said at last.
“And nice to meet you,” Marcia said.
“Thanks for the drinks. That was sweet of you,” Gemma added.
He glanced around the table, then looked directly at me as he said, “I hope I’ll see you again, soon.” Then he left.
As soon as he was gone, they all burst into giggles again. “I think he likes you, Katie,” Gemma said. “Maybe we should cancel your date for the weekend. Looks like you’re going to be busy.”
I still felt sick and too stunned to speak. Connie must have noticed this, for she said, “Katie, hon, what’s wrong?”
“I told you I saw him on the subway this morning, right? Well, he also sent me an e-mail today offering me a job. Three e-mails, come to think of it.”
“What kind of job?” Marcia asked.
“I don’t know. He didn’t say. That’s why I was so suspicious and just deleted them. I thought it was spam, one of those ‘great opportunity’ things where you can make a fortune working at home. He did say something about knowing my experience and work ethic, but how could he? I’m pretty sure I never saw him before this morning. And then to run into him again tonight . . .” I shuddered.
The others now looked a lot more serious. “What company was he with?” Marcia asked.
“Something like MSI, Inc.”
She shook her head. “Never heard of it.”
“You don’t think it’s a real job offer, do you?”
“I don’t know, but I doubt it. Headhunters do contact people out of the blue, and sometimes they’re vague about what company they’re representing, but they usually tell you how they heard about you, and they usually recruit more in the, um, executive ranks.” In other words, they wouldn’t be out trying to steal a glorified secretary. “I wonder if this company is a search firm. It is possible that it was someone in your company who recommended you, maybe someone who’s accepted another job but who hasn’t given notice yet and who’s recommended names of other people to steal.”
That was certainly possible. Anyone on the marketing staff at my company could very easily be jumping ship, and they’d be sure to do anything they could to get back at Mimi on their way out, like having her assistant recruited. I liked to think that in spite of the difficult conditions and my unfortunate lack of city sophistication, I’d done a good enough job that my coworkers would be willing to recommend me. Still, the fact that the guy had shown up tonight made me nervous.
As if echoing my thoughts, Marcia added, “What is weird is that you’ve been seeing him around town. Recruiters don’t usually work that way. They set up meetings rather than ambushing you and your friends with free drinks. And if a coworker recommended you, how did he know what you look like and how to find you away from work? This morning on the subway, was there any way he could have got your name or where you work? Did he follow you out of the subway?”
I shook my head. “No. He got off a few stops before I did.”
“You don’t have an ID badge or a luggage tag on your briefcase with your business card visible, do you?”
“No. I know better than that.”
“Hmm. Weird.”
The mood around the table was a lot gloomier than it had been before I confessed to the weirdness, and I hated being the wet blanket, so I said, “Well, if you thought he was hot, you should have seen the other guy who was on the subway this morning.” They pressed me for details, and soon we were back in the swing of an evening out with friends.
I didn’t sleep well that night, as visions of fairies, gargoyles, Mimi, and Rod danced through my head. The sleepless night meant I was out of bed early enough to walk to work, which I hoped diminished my chances of running into the same trio on the subway. I knew that the odds of randomly seeing the same three people on any one subway car were slim, but after yesterday, I wasn’t taking any chances.
I sipped from a travel mug of coffee and ate a bagel as I walked and tried to think of what I should do. There wasn’t much I could do. It wasn’t like I’d respond to that shady job offer.
I’d just keep deleting Rod’s e-mails. If he continued to show up around me, I supposed I could get a restraining order, but until he was stealing my underwear and sending me threatening letters, I doubted the police would care all that much.
Nope, all I could do was focus my attention on surviving Mimi. Today, I got to work before she did, so I had a chance to catch my breath before I had to deal with her. She must have had a busy night with Werner, as she hadn’t left me her usual half-dozen e-mails from home telling me things she needed me to do first thing in the morning. As I’d expected, there was also another message from good old Rodney Gwaltney. I couldn’t resist opening it.
This one was addressed to “Katie” instead of “Kathleen.” “It was a pleasure to see you again last night and to meet all of your delightful friends,” it said. “I know I must have startled you, but please believe that I mean you no harm. Quite the contrary. My offer is truly one you can’t afford to pass up. You are more valuable than you realize. Please contact me at your earliest convenience.”
I was tempted to write back and tell him that if his offer was so good and so aboveboard, he shouldn’t have a problem telling me what it was. My mama didn’t raise any dummies, and even in a small town I’d know better than to contact a strange man who was so vague about his intentions. With a great sense of satisfaction, I hit the delete key.
Since Mimi still wasn’t in, I took advantage of the opportunity to check my personal e-mail. There was the message from Gemma about dinner. And there was yet another message from Rodney. I added his address to the spam filter and deleted the message, unread, along with all the messages telling me I could lose weight, increase my breast size, make money at home, grow a bigger penis, buy herbal Viagra without a prescription, and get a lower mortgage rate. If all those messages were true, everyone would be slim, attractive, wealthy love machines. Obviously, that wasn’t the case, so odds were, the job offer was no more real than all the other junk mail.
Mimi was her usual charming self when she arrived, meaning that she really was acting charming, and anyone who hadn’t seen her evil incarnation would think she was just the coolest boss ever. Maybe ol’ Werner had bought some of that herbal Viagra stuff. She remained that way all morning, but the daggers made an appearance at lunchtime.
I was sitting at my desk, trying to salvage one of her memos into something readable by English speakers, when she stuck her head into my cube. “Are you going to lunch?” she asked.
“Not right now, thanks,” I said absently, still focusing on my computer screen. “I need to finish this, and I brought a sandwich.”
“You know, it wouldn’t hurt you to be more sociable around the office. Eating lunch at your desk every day isn’t good for office unity. I’d prefer for you to go out with the rest of the staff.”
I had to bite my tongue to hold back all of the responses that popped into my head, like telling her that she was the main problem with office unity and that I’d go out to lunch with her at the pricey bistros she preferred when she paid me enough money to be able to afford it. I certainly wasn’t going to waste my precious entertainment dollars on socializing with her.
Fortunately, this was just one of her drive-by shootings and she didn’t seem to want a response. Before I could think of anything to say that wouldn’t get me fired on the spot, she was gone. Feeling lower than a snake’s belly in a wheel rut, as my grandma used to say, I went back to work on the memo. My one spark of rebellious revenge was to leave a grammatical error. She’d never know the difference—obviously, since she was the one who’d written it—and since it was her name on the memo, anyone who did know the difference would get at least a whiff of incompetence from her.
Then I got my sack lunch, changed into my walking shoes, and headed out to Battery Park. There was something about looking at the water, with the Statue of Liberty looming not too far in the distance, that helped calm me down.
Plenty of other people were out enjoying the gorgeous early fall day. There were a couple of busloads of tourists toting cameras, a few classes of schoolkids waiting for the ferry to the Statue of Liberty, and a lot of lower Manhattan business types enjoying the same kind of office escape I was.
A guy roller-skated past me, and I wouldn’t have given him a second thought if it weren’t for the elf ears he wore. I watched as he skated down the sidewalk and met up with a girl wearing fairy wings. I wasn’t sure if it was the same Miss Airy Fairy I’d seen the day before or if I was wrong about those things not being a fashion trend. The elf and the fairy gave each other an enthusiastic kiss. Nobody else in the park seemed to notice them.
Then I wondered what I found so weird about the situation. It wasn’t like there really was a roller-skating elf kissing a fairy, given that neither elves nor fairies actually existed. It was just two people in costume, and that shouldn’t faze me at all. I’d known people in college who’d gone to class for weeks in their live-action role-playing game costumes when they were in the middle of a major campaign, and that wasn’t even in the weirdness of New York.
I turned my head and noticed a man in silver skin paint and a metallic jumpsuit doing robot mime for a crowd of tourists. I didn’t think that was particularly strange, so why did all this other stuff bother me so much? I guess I wasn’t as sophisticated as I wanted to be.
With a sigh, I shook the crumbs out of my sandwich bag, folded it up, and put it back in my paper lunch sack, which I then folded neatly and stuck in my purse. I dropped my apple core in a garbage can as I passed it and headed back to my office with a heavy heart. Every time I went out for lunch, it grew more and more difficult to force myself back inside. That was yet another reason I usually ate at my desk.
Mimi must not have found a group to go out to lunch with, for she was already back in the office when I returned. “Where have you been?” she shrieked, loud enough for the whole floor to hear. Dogs in Battery Park City whimpered and put their paws over their ears.
“At lunch,” I said as calmly as I could. Getting mad back at Mimi only escalated the situation.
“I thought you said you weren’t going to lunch,” she accused.
“I said I’d brought my lunch. I just took it out of my office to eat it.”
By now people were staring, heads peeping up over the top of cubicle walls like prairie dogs peering out of their holes. “You should tell me when you’re leaving the office.”
“You were at lunch.” I frowned in fake concern and tried to keep my voice from shaking. “Am I supposed to get permission to take a lunch break? I wasn’t aware of that policy.”
There wasn’t anything she could say to that, not with so many witnesses. She’d never get a reprimand about daring to leave the office for lunch while she herself was gone to stick. Unfortunately, she knew she was powerless, and she hated that more than anything. “I needed the draft of that news release from PR before I could go to the executive meeting,” she snapped. “I tried calling you from the executive conference room to bring it to me, but you weren’t at your desk.”
“I put it in your in-box this morning, as soon as I got it from Leah.”
Now she was really angry. Most bosses would be glad to find that their employees were competent, but not Mimi. Competent employees made her look bad and took away all of her excuses. She must have shown up at the executive meeting without the release, then tried to blame me, saying I hadn’t given it to her. With glaring, bugging Evil Mimi eyes, she whirled back to her office, snatched the release out of her in-box and stalked off toward the elevators. Her body language said, “I’m not through with you yet, missy.”
I was almost in tears as I slunk into my cubicle, fell into my desk chair, and changed back into my office shoes. She made me so angry, and since I couldn’t do anything about her, my frustration came out in tears. The last thing I wanted was for her to think she’d made me cry, so I sat blinking furiously in my cubicle.
My hands shook as I raised them to my computer keyboard and hit a key to bring the scr
een back to life. The message-waiting indicator was blinking, and there at the top of my e-mail in-box was a message from Rodney Gwaltney. I opened it. It was the usual stuff talking about what a great opportunity he had for me.
I knew it had to be a scam, but I couldn’t take much more of this job, so I had to either find another one or admit defeat and go back home. Maybe a nice Texas girl like me wasn’t cut out for life in the big city. But before I gave up, I thought I ought to give it one more shot. I’d have to do whatever it took to find another job.
Before I realized what I was doing, I’d hit Reply and typed out, “When would you like to meet? My schedule is pretty busy, so it will have to be at lunchtime or after work.” No matter what he was offering me, it had to be better than this. Then, before I could change my mind, I hit Send.
As soon as I sent the message, I regretted it. What had I gotten myself into? I knew they only opened the firewall to let e-mail come and go every few minutes, so there was still a chance that I could call IT and ask them to kill it, but that would mean admitting I’d responded to a job offer. I was sure the computer guys wouldn’t tell on me. They’d sympathize, since they had to help an ungrateful Mimi with one kind of computer problem or another on a daily basis. The longer I hesitated, the lower my chances were of taking it back.
But I couldn’t bring myself to make that call. Worst-case scenario, aside from the sex slavery possibility, was that Rodney might leave me alone if I met with him and still turned him down. There was always the possibility that the offer was everything he said it was, but I knew that really good things usually came with a catch.
I forced myself to concentrate on my work instead of thinking about the job, but every time I heard the ding that announced new mail, I quickly clicked over. They were pretty much all from people needing to get on Mimi’s calendar or asking if she’d yet looked at something that she had asked for last week and said was urgent.
Maybe Rodney hadn’t been serious after all. It was just a game he played with innocent young women on the subway. In addition to doing whatever he did to make women drool over him like they did, he also liked to pretend he had power over their lives. But that still didn’t answer the question of how he knew who I was and how to find me to send the job offer. I really shouldn’t have responded.
Enchanted, Inc. (Enchanted Inc #1) Page 3