Revenge (Volume 1)

by J J Knight

  Why am I doing data entry? A high school dropout could do this job.

  “I do have business management training,” I say to Nick.

  He sneezes from the dust and grabs a tissue from a nearby box to blow his nose. “And I’m an executive here, with ten years at the company. I’m thirty-one. Last year when we got bonuses, I got a car.”

  Nick’s facial expressions don’t vary much, so I can’t tell if he’s joking.

  “You really got a car?” I ask.

  “Yes. A bunch of us did.”

  “And now you’re here in the basement? What did you do?”

  “I said no to Maggie Clark.”

  The telephone on the table next to him rings. The loud, shrill sound startles me into a muffled scream.

  “Speak of the devil,” he says. He picks up the phone and holds his finger to his lips to shush me. “Maggie. My queen. What can I do for you?”

  I pull out the disk and exchange it for the next one.

  So much for finding treasure. These blue disks contain what appear to be casual photos from a Christmas party from at least a decade ago, or maybe two, by the look of the clothes. The resolution is really grainy by today’s standards. I can’t imagine photos of catered food being of value to anyone, which makes me wonder if we’re actually being punished, rather than put to work.

  Nick is staring right at me. “Yes, brown hair, brown eyes. You think? Really? Pretty enough for Stephanie? Hang on. Hey, Jess?”

  “What?”

  “Did you get attacked yesterday?”

  I blink over at him, wondering if this is some new first-day prank.

  Who’s really on the phone? And how do they know about yesterday’s mugging?

  Chapter 6

  Nick holds his hand over the mouthpiece of the phone.

  He repeats the question, “Did you get attacked yesterday?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He looks at me like I’m an idiot. “Were you with your body all day?”

  “I wasn’t attacked. I did have my wallet taken from me, and then I got it back. No big deal.”

  He moves his hand off the mouthpiece and turns his back to me. He keeps talking to the person on the phone, but I can’t hear what he’s saying.

  I roll my eyes and decide I’m not falling for his joke.

  Now I’m thinking about yesterday, and my brief yet memorable encounter with the sexy singer who teased me about my blue shoes.

  I shouldn’t give him another thought, since he turned into such a jerk by the end. He went from offering to buy me a meal to giving me a rude gesture as he stormed off. Unless he hadn’t flashed me his middle finger. Maybe he was just in a hurry and waving goodbye.

  Yeah, right, Jess. And maybe he’ll turn out to be Prince Charming. He’s just waiting to sweep you up in those muscular arms of his, with that bad-boy tattoo flexing over his bicep.

  Ah, but it would be nice. Those dreamy arms. That gritty voice.

  I’m startled from my daydream by a clatter. Nick noisily hangs up the phone. His call with the vice president has finished—if that was actually her on the line.

  “Do you remember what I told you?” he asks me.

  “Save the files to the local drive and then to the network.”

  “No, about Maggie Clark. You’re going up there to meet with her.”

  “You told me to always say yes.”

  “Good girl. Now, let’s get you spiffed up. You can’t make a good first impression covered in dirt.”

  I look down at my clothes and find streaks of gray dust all over my navy blue blazer and skirt. The dirty filing boxes have made a disaster of my best clothes. I didn’t think to bring a lint roller.

  Nick is already on his feet, unrolling a length of packing tape. He wraps the tape around his hand, sticky-side out, and dives at my chest.

  I squeal and twirl my chair so my back’s to him.

  He groans. “Don’t be such a wuss when you get up to Maggie’s office.” He hands me the wad of sticky tape. “Here, pat yourself. I wasn’t trying to feel you up. You’re not my type. Honestly.”

  Using the sticky tape to pull the light dust off my navy suit works surprisingly well. “Why are you helping me?” I ask Nick. “You don’t even know me.”

  “I was once like you.”

  Standing now, I get the last specks off my skirt.

  “You were once a naive intern?” I ask.

  “No. Something else.”

  I frown at him, annoyed by his mysterious ways. First he made the comments in the elevator about watching my back, and now this? He’s trying to deliberately keep me off balance. I’m pretty sure he has an ulterior motive. I haven’t known many schemers in my life, but Nick strikes me as a schemer. I still like him, in spite of this.

  We walk back over to the elevator, and Nick shows me how to use my keycard to get back again.

  “No offense, but I don’t want to come back,” I say.

  “You think you’ll get promoted on your first day?”

  “I’ve got to try.”

  His neutral expression doesn’t falter. “Top floor,” he says.

  I push the button for the tenth floor.

  Morris Music takes up five floors of the building, or six if you include this mysterious archives basement. The executive offices are up on the top floors. I thought it would take me years of hard work to get called up there, but now here I am, going on my very first day. My mouth goes dry, my throat scratchy.

  Standing in the elevator, I stare through the opening at Nick with wide eyes, wishing he’d come with me. The doors begin to close. I nervously thrust my hand out and press the button to keep the doors open.

  “Nick, what did you mean, you were once like me?”

  “Let that button go,” he says.

  I release the button, and a few seconds later, the metallic doors begin to close between us.

  Before he disappears, I ask urgently, “Were you once an intern?”

  He laughs. “No. But I was once a virgin.”

  The elevator doors close, but the word virgin has already flown into the small space. The word swirls around, taunting me.

  Why would Nick say such a thing?

  And what does it have to do with my meeting with the vice president?

  With each floor the elevator ascends, my mouth gets more dry. The navy blue suit that seemed to fit me so well this morning feels loose in some spots and tight in others.

  I can’t shake the feeling I’m in trouble.

  Nan says whenever we feel guilty, we need to take extra care to be polite and helpful until we figure out what we did wrong. Our conscience will lead us out of trouble.

  The elevator stops on almost every floor. People step on and off, ignoring the girl huddling in the corner.

  I glance over at the mirrored wall to check my hair. My straight brown hair is tied up in a twist. I thought the style would make me look corporate and sophisticated, but all I can see is my ears sticking out. Did they always look like monkey ears or is this a new thing? I feel sick. And now I can actually see my cheeks reddening with embarrassment.

  Why did Nick say I’m a virgin? I’m twenty-two. It’s not reasonable to think a college graduate might be that way. Maybe it’s my monkey ears?

  The elevator reaches the eighth floor, and the doors open. The people next to me step off, and a woman in a curve-hugging red dress steps on. Her overwhelming perfume is as difficult to ignore as her huge boobs, which she’s flaunting in the low-cut dress. I try not to stare. She’s got a lot of sun damage from over-tanning. I’ll have to wear sunscreen all the time now that I’m in LA.

  My dry throat is irritated by her sickly sweet perfume. I hold my cough until the elevator stops on the ninth floor and she steps off.

  Alone now, I turn and take a good look at my monkey ears and my hair. I reach up to loosen the clip holding up my twist. I gasp in horror at two dark streaks visible along the seam of my blue blazer. Oh, no. I’ve sweated through my blouse
and onto my blazer, which is dry clean only.

  The elevator dings and the doors open.

  Tenth floor.

  Abandoning the idea of taking down my hair, I clench my arms to my sides and step out.

  This floor has a more spacious layout than Human Resources. I’m in a wide hallway that looks more like a spa than an office. There are soft lights dotting the wall instead of fluorescents overhead.

  To the left is a large meeting room behind a glass wall. I bet some huge, multi-million dollar deals get made in there.

  I follow the hall to the right, into a waiting room lit with natural sunshine. The receptionist on this floor greets me warmly. No wonder she’s more pleasant than the one on the third floor—she’s got an unobstructed view of the city through her own window.

  “I’m Jessica, here to see Ms. Clark.” I don’t even know if Maggie Clark is married, but I take a guess that she likes to be called Ms.

  The receptionist looks amused, pressing her lips together in a sweet smile. She’s about my age, and she’s also wearing a blue suit, but hers has topstitching and looks like it came from a designer boutique. I wonder how much receptionists make. Is it really that much more than interns?

  Sweetly, she says, “Next time, don’t wear perfume.”

  “I didn’t. There was a woman in the elevator.”

  The pretty, brown-haired receptionist scrunches her face for a moment, then relaxes.

  She moves her manicured hands up to her modest-sized chest and mimes having big boobs, like the woman in the elevator.

  “Did she look like this?” The receptionist pretends to boost up the imaginary bust.

  “Yes,” I say, laughing with relief.

  I’m glad she believes me about the woman. I may be new to corporate life, but I do know enough not to wear strong perfumes to an office, where some people might have allergies.

  She presses a button on the phone at her desk and says softly, “Jessica is here now.” She releases the button and looks up at me, her blue eyes friendly. “That woman in the elevator was Stephanie. She works in a department that doesn’t officially exist, so she has a different set of rules.”

  “Really? That’s funny, because I work down in archives. That’s an entire floor that doesn’t officially exist.”

  She presses her lips together, suppressing a laugh. “Stephanie’s department is a little different from yours.” She looks me over again. “Or maybe not.” She gestures toward a set of double doors behind her. “You can head in there any time.”

  I take a deep breath and start to walk around the reception desk and toward the doors.

  The girl stops me abruptly. “Jess, can I give you a word of advice?”

  I stop and turn back, careful to keep my expression light and not show my anxiety. “Sure.”

  “When Maggie asks you for something, don’t say yes right away.”

  “What?”

  “Say no. She won’t respect you if you’re too easy.”

  My heart drops down into my stomach. This is the exact opposite of what Nick told me to do, and I don’t even know what I’m up here for.

  The sick feeling creeps up again.

  Chapter 7

  I force myself to walk forward. I’m going to meet the vice president of Morris Music.

  I know almost nothing about Maggie Clark. Nick told me to say yes to anything she asks. The receptionist told me to say no.

  Maybe I’ll just keep my mouth shut the whole time.

  My hand trembles as I pull open one of the double doors.

  Walking in slowly, I try to get my bearings while still appearing more confident than I am.

  Where is Jess the tomboy? The old me would push past the boys racing to the top of the stack of hay bales and proclaim herself queen of the castle. She wasn’t scared. You put a skirt on me, and suddenly I’m nervous and awkward.

  The vice president’s top floor office is to die for. This place looks like something in an architecture magazine. It’s gleaming and bright, full of designer furniture.

  “Over here, sweet thing,” calls out the woman who must be Maggie Clark.

  She’s not at the enormous desk that dominates the room. She’s perching in a sitting area surrounded by leafy green plants.

  “I’m in the jungle,” she says, waving in case I still hadn’t found her.

  There must be a dozen enormous potted plants, some as big as trees, surrounding a sitting area with four leather armchairs.

  A petite woman of about fifty, with platinum blonde hair and oversized glasses, sits in one of the chairs. She’s got an open laptop resting on her knees.

  “This is quite the jungle.” I approach carefully, waiting to see which chair she’d like me to take, if at all. “You’re like a tiger in a lair.”

  As soon as the word tiger has leapt from my mouth, I regret my words.

  Luckily, she takes my joke the right way and laughs. “A tiger! That’s me, all right. I like you, Jessica.” She pats the seat of the chair nearest her. I carefully take a seat, crossing my legs like a lady.

  “And how about you?” she asks. “Are you a tiger, Jessica? Can you growl for me?”

  My cheeks grow hot. “Grrrrr.” Now I feel ridiculous. Was this a request I was supposed to say yes to? Or did I cave too easily for her to respect me?

  She taps away at her laptop for a moment, her oversized glasses sliding down her nose. She sniffs, her nostrils flaring. “Ah, you’ve met Stephanie,” she says, sniffing again.

  I nod, even though she’s not looking at me and won’t see my response. She’s focused on her laptop screen, which I can’t see from my angle.

  Underneath her fringe of platinum hair, she has tidy brown eyebrows, filled in with an eyebrow pencil. I never could figure out eyebrow pencils, among other things. Her eyes are icy blue, and magnified by the lenses of her glasses. As I’m watching her eyes, I can see her pupils dilate and contract as she focuses on her computer screen.

  “Do you like tattoos?” she asks.

  “I don’t have any tattoos.”

  Her eyes don’t waver from the screen. “But you like them on a boy, especially if he’s cute.”

  “Sure.”

  “Who’s this?” She clicks on the laptop, and music begins to play.

  From the tinny little speakers, I hear a guitar strumming, and a man singing, “Why did you wear those blue shoes?”

  In a heartbeat, I’m transported back to the sidewalk, staring down at my silly, blue suede shoes. I’m still upstairs on the tenth floor, wearing the dark brown heels that go with my suit, but music is magic.

  Music transports me.

  With a few lines of song, I’m feeling the intoxicating spotlight of his attention, focused solely on me.

  This is the beauty of music: the power to take us on a journey through time and space, folding up the distance between two hearts like a paper road map.

  I remember his sly, fox-like expression as he sings, “Pretty brunette girl, where did you buy blue shoes?”

  My forearms fill with goosebumps.

  Then, I hear through Maggie Clark’s laptop speakers, my own voice. “My heart isn’t blue,” I say. My words repeat over the music, autotuned to match the melody.

  My heart isn’t blue.

  It plays a third time. My heart isn’t blue.

  And then it switches to him singing again.

  Hearing his voice brings us into a secret place together, where his tattooed arms are always reaching for me, lifting me up, holding me. All is good, and I am safe. I’ll never be alone, and my heart won’t be blue.

  Maggie snaps the laptop shut with a crisp clack.

  “And then you know the rest.” Her hand waves between us.

  I stammer, “I only heard the song once.”

  “I’ve seen the video a few times. He sings about your shoes while you stand there looking all innocent. You’re like a baby deer lost in the woods, with your big, brown eyes all dewy and captivated. When the man with the hood
covering his face darts in and tries to take your wallet, your expression is utterly priceless. Your acting is superb, my dear. In fact, I almost believed it. Almost.”

  My jaw drops open. I reach up with one hand and wipe at the skin-colored makeup covering the bruise around my eye. “I really was mugged,” I say. “Look. Someone hit me, right in the eye, and knocked me down.”

  Her expression tightens. Her lips pinch together in a rosebud as she stares directly into me. For such a petite woman, she has a tiger and a half’s worth of attitude.

  “But the mugger didn’t hurt you,” she says. “It’s the woman tourist who was standing next to you. She struck you with her elbow. Your black eye wasn’t part of the plan at all.”

  “What plan?”

  “To go viral with this video, of course. You and your friend. Your sexy friend who’s going to make an international audience of women scream and swoon and fantasize about cheating on their husbands and boyfriends.”

  My mouth opens and closes.

  She keeps going, getting excited. “The way he swoops in and lifts you up is perfect. And the look on your face when he hands you his guitar! That pathetic old thing no self-respecting musician would bother to put in a case.” She makes a sound of disgust. “And then he runs down the street like a superhero, into unknown danger, to get your wallet back. Perfect. They should make a movie, with a full album tie-in. The 360 deal on this would be groundbreaking.”

  As her words wash over me, I take a look around at the big plants with their green leaves. Maggie’s wearing a taupe skirt and a cardigan sweater covered in leopard spots. She wants to look like a jungle cat. She wants to scare me. Just like the bully who gets his way to the top of the hay bale pyramid through intimidation rather than a fair race.

  I’m not taking another word of someone calling me a liar. I’m not afraid of a little hard work, but even my dream job isn’t worth being treated like a liar.

  I uncross my legs and rise up from the chair.

  “What happened to me yesterday was a terrible thing,” I say slowly. “On my first full day in this city, I was robbed and pushed down. It’s not the worst thing that’s happened to me, but I wouldn’t have chosen it. And I certainly wouldn’t come into your office and lie to you, Ms. Clark. I have nothing but respect for you. However, I can’t be of any use to you if you don’t feel the same way.”