by Amelia Wilde
“Ms. Davis.” I swivel around in my seat, a prepared smile on my face. “Am I interrupting?”
Yeah, but if this is my big break— “Not at all. I was coming to a stopping point. What can I do for you?” I stopped saying “what’s up?” after four days at Wilder Enterprises. Ms. Lillianfield is the gatekeeper, that much is clear, and she is surprisingly old-fashioned for a woman who works for one of the world’s biggest energy companies. The slight downturn of the corners of her mouth told me she hated “what’s up,” so I scrubbed it from my vocabulary, along with “hey” and “no problem.”
She considers me for a moment or two, taking me in from head to toe. I’ve started to subtly mimic her style, which usually consists of a smart skirt suit and hair played up in a tight bun. I see a flash of approval in her eyes when she gives the bun in my own hair a cursory glance. “You’ve been doing well here.” Approval or not, her voice is still a little begrudging. I incline my head and wait. Ms. Lillianfield also doesn’t like to waste time on pleasantries like being thanked for compliments.
Another long moment of appraisal. “In view of this, I’d like to reward you with a more complex assignment.”
She sure plays her cards close to her chest. “I’d love to take on a bigger project.”
Ms. Lillianfield gives me a sharp nod. “Wonderful. I’ll send you an email in about ten minutes with all the details. Come to me if you have any questions.” Her tone indicates that if I have questions, I’m probably not cut out for whatever this assignment is.
“Thank you, Ms. Lillianfield.” By the time the words are out of my mouth, she’s already halfway back to her office.
My heart beats a little faster in my chest. This could be it—this could be the sign that I’m starting to gain a foothold here, and then I can really get moving on this case. They’d be so impressed if I came in early and under budget on this one, and there’d be no stopping my ascent at the FBI.
I fly through the rest of the expense reports and wait for the promised email to come in, tapping my foot anxiously against the industrial carpet. Marie pokes her head around the cubicle wall. “Did something happen? I heard Lillianfield in here a minute ago.”
“Waiting on a new assignment.” Her lips go into a round O, and I smile at her.
My computer pings—a new email has arrived—and I whip my head back toward the screen. It takes a second to load. “Come on, come on.”
Ms. Davis—
I’d like you to coordinate a meeting for executives Feldman, Overhiser, and Childs with the individuals listed below at some point during the Mumbai conference next week. This will need to be slotted into available openings in their schedules, confirmed with all three of their staffs, and coordinated to successful completion…
I stifle a giggle at “successful completion,” then force my face into a sober expression as I read the rest of the email.
This is it.
This has to be it, because there have been rumblings in the cubicle farm about Overhiser and Childs each posting and hiring for chief executive assistant positions in the next few weeks. There’s no way this isn’t a test to see if I’d be cut out for one of those jobs.
I can’t hide a small smile of satisfaction from appearing on my lips. Despite everything, despite the torn pantyhose and the jelly doughnut stain, I’m making headway. I’m going to untangle this thing, and I’m going to do it in record time.
A note at the bottom of the email catches my eye. Feldman, Overhiser, and Childs report directly to Mr. Wilder, who will have final approval over all negotiations made during this meeting. Please prepare a summary of the outcome and have it to him within twenty-four hours of the meeting’s conclusion.
My heart flies into my throat.
In the back of my mind, I knew that the executives at Wilder Enterprises would come into contact with Dominic Wilder. I didn’t think that making this leap would involve reaching out to him personally, even if it is entirely work-related.
He’ll see my name on the summary that I send.
I shake my head a little. It’s not going to make an impression on him. I’m undercover, for God’s sake, and dropping that box of doughnuts was the last—and only—time I need to come to his attention.
He’s probably forgotten about me already, I reassure myself, but deep down, I’m not entirely convinced.
6
Dominic
“Mr. Wilder?” Emily stands at the doorway to my office, her hand poised to knock gently in case I’m buried in some work.
In fact, I am not buried in work. I’m staring out the window, taking in the Manhattan cityscape on a brilliant June day—and I’m thinking of Vivienne Davis.
I haven’t seen her in over three weeks, not since she swept in on that storm and wormed her way into my mind, but more and more of my days have been devoted to imagining what she’s doing. What she’s wearing. How she’s spending her evenings.
Now I’m caught by my own secretary, daydreaming about her.
I clear my throat and straighten my back, keeping my tone light, keeping my voice even, like the thought of bending Vivienne Wilder over my desk hasn’t preoccupied me for the last ten minutes. “Yes, Emily?”
“There’s a Chris O’Connor on the line for you.”
That name makes me perk up. “Chris O’Connor?”
“He said he was an old friend.”
“He’s not lying about that.” I keep my face impassive, and so does Emily, but there’s a tension in the air that I can’t hide. So I decide to crush it beneath my heel and move on to the next moment. “Put him through.”
“Of course.”
It takes her a few moments to get back to her desk, and I stare at the handset in front of me. Chris O’Connor went to Yale with me, and now he’s with the FBI. He’s been with the FBI for seven years, long enough to—
The phone beeps with the incoming call. I pick it up.
“Mr. Wilder, I have Mr. O’Connor on the line.” Emily’s voice is smooth, even.
“Thank you, Emily. It’s been a long time since I’ve heard from you, Chris.”
Chris waits a few beats for Emily to click off the call, and then his voice rumbles across the line. “Hey, Dominic.” His tone is reserved, cautious, nothing like the college student who used to whoop and posture every time he scored in a game of one-on-one.
“You have some news for me?” I don’t know what the hell this could be about—nothing in my personal life this time—but Chris isn’t the type to call and chat. He’s too busy now, and so am I. We lived together for two years as college roommates. We don’t have to check in often.
“Listen—” He hesitates, and my throat goes tight. This is weird. If Chris ever does call, it’s to invite me out for a drink, and that happens on the order of once every couple of years when he’s getting nostalgic about something.
“Spit it out, man.”
He lets out a sigh. “Look, I shouldn’t be calling.” Then why are you calling? I want to ask the question, but I wait. “Are you free for a quick lunch? Or a drink?”
Something tells me this isn’t about Yale, or catching up.
“Sure. I can meet you in fifteen minutes. Where at?”
He names a bar a few blocks down from the Wilder Building. I hang up and feel a pit in my stomach.
Chris sits across from me at a back booth, hands wrapped around a cold mug of beer. He twists and turns his head, scanning the room, and then looks back at me. “So…how are things?”
I sip my own beer and narrow my eyes at him. “You didn’t call me down here to ask me how things are, and we both know it.”
His blonde hair is darkening with age, but it gives him a certain sophistication that he definitely didn’t have in college. He takes another sip of his beer, then leans back and looks me in the eye. “I shouldn’t be telling you this, but I couldn’t—” He shakes his head, looking pained.
I raise both hands into the air. “Don’t tell me anything that’s going to get you in t
rouble.”
“Yeah, but—” He lets out a breath. “Okay. Listen. The department is investigating Wilder Enterprises.”
I can’t help but laugh. “For what? And why haven’t I been notified?”
Chris drops his voice. “Economic espionage.”
I glare at him. “Are you screwing with me?” It would be out of character for him, but this seems ridiculous. Who would be stealing from me? I have a vetting process in place at every level of the company, and I keep a tight grip on what goes in and out.
He doesn't look at all like he’s joking. “No. Look—somebody is stealing your tech secrets and passing them off to a group in China. We’re not sure if they’re connected to the Chinese government, but—” He presses his lips into a thin line. “The investigation is undercover at this point because the team had…some suspicions.”
It takes me half a heartbeat to understand what he’s saying, and when I do, anger surges up into my throat. I answer him through gritted teeth. “If you’re suggesting that I’m conspiring to benefit foreign governments, then—”
Now it’s Chris’s turn to throw up his hands. “I’m not. I’ve vouched for you. But this has been going on for a good three weeks, and I couldn’t keep you in the dark about it.”
I pull out my wallet, throw a bill that’s far too large onto the table, and stand up. “I’ll be in contact with someone at the Department. You can bet on it.”
“No. Dominic—”
“What do you expect me to do, Chris? Sit here and take it?”
“Give us a few more weeks,” he pleads, his eyes wide. For an instant, I see him as he was at twenty years old, almost a decade ago now, the gangly kid on campus who everybody loved. “Sit tight, Dom. I swear to you, we’ve got someone good on it.”
They’ve gotten someone into the company under my nose, and Chris isn’t about to blow his cover. My gut churns. I don’t need this to go public about as much as Chris doesn’t need to lose his job over leaking a confidence to an old friend. Still, my skin feels clammy. Someone inside Wilder Enterprises is screwing me over. I rule with an iron fist, and someone…someone…is wriggling through, passing off valuable information to a contact in China.
Jesus Christ.
Chris lowers his voice, trying to keep his cool. “A few more weeks. Let the team have a little more time, and we’ll figure it out. We’ll have it shut down.” He swallows hard. “I know it isn’t you, man. I know that, and I have your back.”
He’s trying to do me a favor, and my old friend is risking his job to do it. The least I can do is give him what he asks.
“Fine.” Chris’s face relaxes. “But if this shit isn’t resolved as soon as possible—and I mean as soon as possible—there will be hell to pay.”
“I know.” Chris reaches for his beer, nods across the table to me. “At least finish your drink, man. Don’t raze the city to the ground yet.”
7
Vivienne
I rub one hand across the back of my neck, trying to work out the knot with my fingers.
This job wasn’t nearly the in-and-out production that I thought it was going to be, and the last ten days have been hell. It’s at the point where I’ve almost stopped looking for Dominic’s car in the mornings while I’m moving along that last block to the office.
It’s been a long evening on the phone with people ten hours away in a different time zone, and my back aches from sitting in the chair. My eyes are dry and they ache behind the glasses I’ve been wearing instead of my contacts, and I’m starving—but it’s over.
The project is almost over.
I searched out the perfect block of time in the midst of the three executives’ tangled schedules, booked a conference room from halfway across the world, triple-checked the details with six different staff members, and even coordinated a meal to be delivered at the ideal interval for a break.
I lean my head into the phone, listening to the final few moments of the meeting. The words are starting to blur together—I’ve been up since five this morning—but the men’s voices sound jovial, satisfied.
“Thank you, Ms. Davis.” Mr. Childs’ drawl breaks into my thoughts, and I bolt upright in my chair. “I think we’re done here.”
I’m proud of myself for not giving any sign of how unbelievably exciting this is, even though I want to leap out of my seat and jump up and down. “Wonderful,” I say, keeping my voice neutral. “Is there anything else I can do for you, gentlemen?”
Overhiser says something in a low voice, but I catch the general tone of it, and the tone makes my skin crawl even from a continent away. The room around him is filled with chortling from the other men. The past ten days have given me a little window into what these people are like, and Overhiser raises the hairs on the back of my neck. It’s a tingling sensation that tells me something’s up with him. I let Jeffries know about it today, before the big meeting began.
“I have a feeling about him,” I told my boss, stabbing my fork into the takeout salad I had for lunch.
“Do you have anything a little less cliché? Any solid evidence?” My boss laughed, his deep voice rumbling across the line.
“No. I have the sense that I’m zeroing in on the inside contact.” There’s been some debate on the rest of the team about whether or not the information is being leaked by someone who infiltrated Wilder Enterprises from the outside, or someone who’s been here all along, and the more time I spend on this project, the more I’d put my money on Mr. Overhiser.
“Follow it up, Viv,” he’d said, and I heard the approval in his voice. Follow it up. I’ve done so whenever he’s given me the green light, and it’s served me well so far.
“That’s all, Ms. Davis,” Mr. Childs says once the background laughter has faded out. “The notes should be hitting your inbox any second now.”
My computer pings. “Confirmed. I’ll have a summary up to Mr. Wilder in no time. Have a good flight back, gentlemen.”
They sign off with a chorus of goodbyes, and then the line goes dead.
“Yes.” I punch my fist into the air, then sag back into my seat.
It’s over—except for one thing.
The summary for Mr. Wilder.
Get it done.
I desperately want to go home. I want to go back to my place—the only place where I can be my real self—and take a shower that lasts for a year, curl up in front of the TV with a bottle of wine and an enormous amount of sushi, and relax.
But that’ll put off this work until tomorrow morning, which will push back everything else, which will make it take one day longer to close this case.
I rub at my neck one more time, then straighten myself up in the chair, pull up the meeting notes, and glare at the screen.
It’s probably the least taxing part of the entire project, but my hands tremble over the keyboard as I type up the summary, save it as a document, and attach it to an email.
Dominic Wilder has almost certainly forgotten about me by now. He might not be so forgetful when he sees my email signature at the bottom of the note.
Dear Mr. Wilder,
I pause, my hands loitering over the keys, and think of his eyes zeroing in on me in the rain, drinking me in, burning through me, that electric hum that raced up my arm when I put my hand in his, the way it felt to steady myself on his arm and breathe in his clean, spicy scent.
I’ve been meaning to thank you for—
I delete that line. So unprofessional, and I already did thank him. Didn’t I? I roll my eyes. Dominic Wilder is not lying awake at night, three weeks later, thinking about how I didn’t thank him for doing what any decent man would do.
I start again.
Please find attached to this email a summary of the meeting with executives Feldman, Overhiser, and Childs for your review.
So far, so good.
I’m available at any time if you have any questions.
I delete that line, too. Like he’s going to have questions for me. This is his company.
I hope you find this helpful.
Delete.
It’s late, and I’m tired. I bite my lip, trying to think of the right phrase to use. Finally, when a yawn takes over my entire body, I slam my hands back down onto the keyboard.
I’m happy to answer any questions about my work.
Best regards,
Vivienne Davis
Executive Support
Then, before I can think about it for another second, I hit send. The email goes on its way with a little whoosh.
I stand up from my desk, rising up on my tiptoes to stretch my calves, and then slip my feet into my high heels. Home. Home now. Then it’s Friday, and then I’m going to spend all weekend reviewing case information, interspersed liberally with Netflix and popcorn.
I’m putting my purse over my shoulder when my computer pings.
“No way,” I say under my breath, and reach for the button on the monitor to put it to sleep for the night. It’ll automatically log me out when I do that.
But the email sender’s name stops me dead.
Dominic Wilder.
What the hell is he doing answering emails at ten o’clock at night?
My heart beats overtime, and both my hands tremble. I should go. I should go and check the email in the morning.
I can’t do it.
I click the mouse furiously, opening the email, ready to be disappointed if it’s an auto-response message, ready to pretend I’m relieved.
Ms. Davis,
Thank you for the summary. Are you available for a quick question?
Dominic Wilder
President, Wilder Enterprises
The next moment, the phone on my desk rings, shattering the silence enveloping the floor, and I give a little shriek, then get myself under control.
My heart in my throat, I snatch up the handset.
“Vivienne Davis.”
“Ms. Davis.” The voice on the other end of the line is his, unmistakably his. “It’s very late to be in the office. I’d like to offer you a ride home.”