by Sierra Rose
My eyebrows lifted into my hair. He invited the children to see the parents get fired?
“He says it builds character,” she whispered, guessing my thoughts. “Says that children shouldn’t be shielded from failure. They should have to look at it head on.”
I wonder how his own family feels about that...
“Usually, it’s over a lot quicker than this.” She gulped and took a step away. “I don’t think anyone on the floor expected him to fire the entire board.”
This time, I was unable to mask my shock.
“He fired the entire board?”
But no sooner could I process this, than the door swung open and twenty or so people rushed past. Not a sound amongst them. Every eye trained on the floor. The man who’d spoken up earlier had a greenish tint to his face. My guess was that he’d make it only as far as the elevator before throwing up.
Then, just as quickly as they’d come, they vanished through the double doors. The secretary disappeared alongside them. Leaving me standing alone in the suddenly empty hall.
A soft voice drifted in from the conference room.
“Ms. Wilder, I’m ready to begin...”
My mouth went dry, my ankles locked, and a cascade of chills went racing down my spine. It didn’t help that the second I touched the door, I heard the man retching in the elevator.
And that was how I interviewed for my position with the Hunter family.
Without further ado, I made my way into the conference room, half-surprised there wasn’t any blood on the floor. I circled around to the opposite side of the table, and came to a stop, my hands folded professionally in front of me. I would not sit unless he invited me to do so.
“Thank you for taking the time.”
I guarantee, I was just as frightened as the people who had just left—but the longer I stood there, the more those nerves channeled themselves into a strange kind of calm. A virtual shield of confidence that I carried around to this very day.
“Well, your harassment of my company was most insistent,” he replied dryly, flipping up some papers to scan through what was presumably my file.
I didn’t flinch at the accusation, but instead nodded with a calm smile. It wasn’t meant as a barb. These people admired persistence. More than that, they admired the self-importance it took to foist yourself upon other people under the arrogant assumption that you were absolutely worth their time.
Either way, apologies and doubt were signs of weakness I couldn’t afford to show in this room. Not now. Not ever. I already had enough working against me.
“Abigail Wilder,” he murmured, reading some more. “You come highly recommended, but I must admit, I haven’t heard of you.”
First trick of the trade: turn a negative into a positive with just a bit of creative spin.
“Mark of a good publicist,” I replied evenly. “I guarantee you haven’t heard of my clients either. At least...nothing that I didn’t want you to know.”
He glanced up, looking as close to amused as I think the man was capable, before returning to the papers. I breathed a silent sigh of relief. First obstacle down. I would have to get these out of the way quickly and efficiently. Because my relative lack of experience wasn’t the only thing I had working against me.
I was twenty years old. Unable to order a drink at any of the bars we went to. The first thing I’d have to do after dashing back across the bridge to Brooklyn, was get myself a fake ID.
But like I said, I had one of those faces that shifted to fit the part. And from everything I’d heard about Mitchell Hunter, when it came to the ages of his women, he tended to round up.
At long last, the file came down. The glasses came off, and he looked at me instead. The resume part of the interview was over—it had told him everything he needed to know. The rest was up to me. Sink or swim. A life in Brooklyn...or the Upper East Side.
“You’ve come on an interesting day,” he murmured, pulling out a monogrammed handkerchief to clean off his glasses. “Must be wondering why you’ve applied to jump aboard what looks like a sinking ship.”
I didn’t miss a beat.
“It doesn’t look that way to me.”
“Oh no?” He gazed at me sharply from atop the throne. “What does it look like to you?”
Time to sell it, Abby. You’ve got twenty seconds.
“It looks like you’re moving in a new direction. No more dead weight. Only fresh things on the horizon.” Keeping my eyes locked warily on him the entire time, I pulled a pen and paper from my bag. “I’m sure if you tell me what those things are, I can start getting the word out.”
He blinked three times. Each one sending me into a mild heart attack. Then the corners of his mouth twitched up into an unnatural smile.
“You’ve got the job.”
I couldn’t believe it. Could not believe it.
Ninety percent of me thrilled with the opportunity—to work for the Hunter Corporation was a dream come true. In all the ways that mattered, there truly was no bigger client. The other ten percent was absolutely terrified of what I’d just gotten myself into.
“Excellent.” I kept my cool for just a moment longer, holding in my celebration until I’d reached the lobby floor. “Who would you like me to coordinate with in corporate office?”
“Oh no, my dear.” He reached over the table and poured himself a glass of scotch. A precise measuring. Not a drop’s deviation from day to day. “I don’t want you for the company.”
My heart fell as I simultaneously wondered if my own family was on their way up just to watch me fail. The pen and paper slid slowly back into my bag.
“You don’t?”
“Not at all.” He lifted the glass to his lips and said the fateful words that would go on to change my life forever. “I want you for my son.”
Now here we were.
I hastened to smooth down my dress, pulling my hair back into a tight bun. I wished Nick would wake up, but he was still passed out cold—oblivious to the dark force that had just walked into his bedroom. Fortunately, a single word from his father was enough to remedy that.
“Nicholas.”
He jerked awake like he’d been having a nightmare, only to open his eyes and gaze upon the real thing. There was a hitch in his breathing, and half the color drained from his face as he hurried to make sure the blankets were still firmly around his waist.
“Dad—what are you doing here?”
That was another thing that had always surprised me. As much as Mitchell going by his first name. The informality of it. That Nick would address him as dad, instead of father. It was as if the family had sat down years ago, and read a book on what a family was supposed to look like. Talk like. Some things had stuck. The others had never really taken in the first place.
“It’s funny that you should ask.” He threw open another set of curtains, ignoring the way his wildly hungover son flinched as the light assaulted his eyes. “I was walking into work this morning and there was a man handing out copies of the New York Times. Imagine what I should see on the cover, but my very own son.”
Nick had told me once that his father was like a winter storm. It wouldn’t kill you, as long as you were prepared. At the moment, we couldn’t have been less prepared.
The paper flew down on the bed between them.
“What is this?”
PLAYBOY NICK HUNTER’S BATTLE FOR OCEANIC JUSTICE
The headline was splashed across the front page. Complete with a photo of Nick standing in the middle of the fountain, warding away police with what looked like a pair of salad tongs.
As far as headlines went, it could have been much worse. The picture on the other hand...
“Mr. Hunter,” I dropped my eyes to the floor, “I can explain—”
“The extent of your usefulness, Ms. Wilder, is in your ability to guarantee that this sort of thing does not happen. Since that is a task at which you have already failed spectacularly, you would do well to keep your mouth shut.”
Nick’s eyes flashed, and he started to get to his feet before remembering he was mostly naked. “You’re really going to blame Abby every time I go and jump into a fountain?”
Mitchell was chillingly calm.
“I want you to think about that sentence, remember that you’re twenty-four years old, and take a long hard look at your life.”
(Now and again, the man did have a bit of a point.)
“But no,” he continued, “I’m not blaming Abby.” He released his son for the briefest of moments, and turned that armor-piercing focus onto me. “Ms. Wilder, despite what you may have come to think of me, I’m not an unreasonable man. I understand that, as a mere mortal battling the astronomical ineptitude of my son, there is only so much you are able to do.”
His eyes narrowed, and I stopped breathing.
“But I do require an explanation.”
For the second time, Nick leapt to my defense.
“Give her a break,” he muttered. “We had this whole shellfish defense going on—”
Mitchell’s voice cracked through the air like a whip.
“Nicholas, be quiet.”
For once, his son obeyed.
Normally, I’d gloat. Over-analyze the exact tone to see if there was any way I could harness its silencing powers for my own use. But there was something rather terrible about the way his father spoke to him. As if he were a portfolio, rather than a person. An investment, rather than a son. I’d noticed it the first time I’d ever met Nick, two years ago in this very room.
Nick had been quite unaware of the fact he was getting a publicist. Like most major decisions in his life, it had been made without either his knowledge or his consent. When he’d stumbled into his bedroom, a Brazilian swimsuit model draped on either arm, he had been as surprised to see me as I was to see him.
For a moment the two of us just stood there. Frozen in shock. Then he turned to Mitchell.
“Thanks, dad.” Even then, I noticed the way his sparkling eyes dimmed a bit when they came to rest on his father. “We can always make room for a fourth.”
I’d sucked in a quick breath. Sure the tycoon was about to pull out some sort of death-ray and electrocute the kid right then and there. But Mitchell never missed a beat.
“This is Abigail Wilder. She’s to be your new publicist.”
Nick froze again, as the models made themselves scarce in the living room.
“My new publicist,” he repeated slowly. “Did I have an old publicist?”
“Precisely my point. If you’re going to continue on living in this...manner,” Mitchell’s eyes coldly swept the room, “then it’s time we bring in professional assistance.”
Nick, then only twenty-two, had pulled himself up to his full height. Looking almost as intimidating as his nightmarish father. “I don’t need a babysitter.”
“Quite the contrary,” his father replied dryly, “you need twelve. But Ms. Wilder here comes highly recommended. She’ll do for a start.”
Nick’s eyes flashed dangerously, but he reined it in—looking me up and down as if measuring how much trouble I might be able to cause him.
“Then I’ll find my own publicist,” he said coldly, pacing to the window.
Mitchell stepped in front of him in an instant, looking like he was on the verge of doing something I’m sure would have made me quit right there on the spot.
“You’re incapable of finding your own pants—if half of what they say in the papers is true.” There was a bit of a snarl in his tone. “You will work with Ms. Wilder. End of discussion.”
But Nick had never been one to take these injustices lying down.
“End of discussion?” he quoted in a voice that sent chills down my spine. “Lest I remind you, Mitchell, the second I turned eighteen I was more than able to make my own decisions—”
But Mitchell just laughed. A sound that sounded like gravel scraping down a freeway.
“Oh, I’m well aware of the decisions you’ve made.” His eyes swept his son from head to toe, making him stand up straighter in spite of himself. “Look at you. Drunk. Thoughtless. Ready to jump into the first empty bed you see.” He shook his head slowly, as his dark eyes dilated almost entirely to black. “For one of the first times, Nicholas, you remind me of your mother.”
With that, he swept out of the room. Leaving me standing behind him. Leaving Nick looking like he’d just gotten slapped in the face.
Today was looking to be more of the same...
“I cannot imagine what possessed you to put on such a spectacle, but the days of such antics are behind you—do you understand?”
Nick said not a word. He simply glared at Mitchell through a pair of red-rimmed eyes.
“The company is in a state of transition,” the man continued. “In just four short months, we’re undertaking the largest merger Wall Street has ever seen. Until the ink is dry, all of our shareholders will be holding their breath. The board will be holding its breath. I will be holding my breath. The last thing we need is a picture of you on the front of the New York Times, splashing stockbrokers from the middle of a damn fountain! Am I making myself clear?!”
It wasn’t often that the man yelled, and it had a profound effect on the room. I reached discreetly behind me to lean against the wall for support, and Nick clenched his teeth together as all the rest of the remaining color drained from his face.
“Yes, sir.”
Mitchell nodded curtly, pleased with his compliance.
“We need stability. We need strength. And above all—we need calm. And you, my son, will become the embodiment of all those things.”
Nick’s chest rose and fell with quick, shallow breaths. But when he spoke, his voice was surprisingly calm. “And how do you expect me to do that?”
“It’s actually quite simple, and nothing you haven’t done before.” Mitchell didn’t smile so much, as he bared his teeth. “You’re going to get a girlfriend.”
Chapter 6
“HEY—WILL YOU COME BACK here?! We need to talk about this!”
As Nick paced swiftly down the hall, I scampered after him—my bare feet skidding on the tile whenever I took a sharp turn. The departure of his father had left us momentarily speechless, but my darling client was never one to stay speechless for long. By the time the door clicked shut, he was already on to his next adventure—compartmentalizing his father deep into the dark recesses of his mind.
“Nick!”
It was like he didn’t even hear me. As he headed down the hall to take a shower, he started shedding what little clothing he had left—one piece at a time.
I ducked strategically as a crumpled sock sailed back my way.
“Nick—come on. This isn’t so bad.”
Sometimes, public relations was as much altering perceptions for your own client, as it was altering those same perceptions for the public eye.
“We can find a nice girl—one who you’ll actually enjoy spending time with.” The other sock came flying my way, and I was quick to correct myself. “Okay—fine. That probably means she won’t be that nice of a girl after all. But you know what I mean.”
I tossed the clothes in the general direction of the linen closet, still slipping and skidding across the tile after him all the while. How the hell did the man have such long legs?!
“You can go out with her a couple times, get your picture taken. Keep your father and his company happy. Who knows? It might even turn into the real—”
I lost my balance entirely and went careening forward, my messy curls sailing out behind me like a wilting flag. My eyes snapped shut as I threw out my arms, but a pair of warm hands caught me. When I opened my eyes, I was staring up into an equally warm smile.
Warm, but uncompromising.
“Sorry Abby,” he set me gently back on my feet, “I’m just not going to do it.”
And that was that. He proceeded into the shower without another word. The conversation was over. I held my tongue and bowed my head to my chest�
��plotting quickly.
It was putting me in a tough position—that much was sure. Whenever I ended up caught in between Nick and his father, it was always the same way.
Nick was the client. The prize. The person for whom I was supposed to be willing to move mountains to satisfy his every desire. Lift heaven and earth to protect him at all costs, either from his own mistakes, or from the malicious intentions of others.
When he said no. That meant no. There really was nothing left to say.
And yet...
His father was the one who technically employed me.
Mitchell Hunter was a shrewd man, and my offer of employment had been a prime example of his skills. While I was essentially on ‘permanent loan’ to his son, working exclusively for Nicholas—I was also technically a member of the company. My paychecks were signed by the Hunter Corporation, not by Nick.
That meant that when Mitchell said yes. It meant yes. There was really nothing left to say.
With two completely opposite ultimatums staring me in the face, I decided to say nothing at all. Instead, I headed downstairs and started up a pot of coffee.
There was a process to it. One that I’d picked up my first week on the job.
To say that Nick lived for coffee, was like saying that the French had a mild affinity for fattening pastries. It was his first true love. Truth be told, it was probably his only true love.
He had the beans imported from alternating countries in South America and Africa alike, depending on average rain fall, soil acidity, and a million other things that went completely over my head. They were kept in an airtight jar, and ground fresh every morning. Measured out to precision. Brewed to precisely the right temperature.
The slightest deviation would be fiercely condemned. A recurrent mistake would most likely end in termination. In a lot of ways, it reminded me of Mitchell and his beloved scotch.
I pulled down the jar with a soft sigh, and started pouring the beans into the grinder.
There had to be some kind of way to get him on board with this. Some iota of wiggle room in which I could get enough of a hold to shake him loose.