Rush said he was working a double tonight and my only plan was to order takeout from one of the Chinese menus magnetized to the side of his fridge. But a drink sounds better. And it’d be nice to have a friend around here, even if I won’t be around more than a month.
“Yeah, that sounds fun, actually. Let’s do it,” I say.
Lillie’s emerald eyes light and her lips pull into a wide grin. “Perfect. There’s a place around the corner with the best strawberry basil martinis you’ll ever have in your entire life. Meet me at the elevators at five?”
I nod as Lillie’s heels click across the tile floor and she locks herself in a stall. I give myself one final check in the mirror, ensuring my stain is covered enough, and I head back out to Mr. Welles’ assistant’s desk. Between fielding phone calls and doing his bidding, she’s been handling my orientation, which so far has consisted of a few forms from HR, a thirty-minute video on sexual harassment in the workplace (standard procedure, she said), and a fifteen minute break—which was when I made the life-altering decision to grab an iced coffee from the employee coffee bar in the lower level.
“Oh, there you are,” Marta says as I round the corner by her desk a moment later. “Thought maybe you got lost.”
She has the longest lashes I’ve ever seen on another human being before—extensions, I’m sure, but she wears them well and they’re just as sleek and polished black as her patent leather Louboutins.
“I’m so sorry about that. I bumped into someone a little while ago and spilled coffee down my shirt and then—”
Marta’s manicured hands fly into the air before becoming little balls of excitement.
“Now it makes sense!” she says, mouth dancing into a grin.
“I’m sorry, I’m not sure what you mean.”
She waves a hand in front of her face, chuckling to herself. “Calder walked by here a little bit ago and handed me a fifty dollar bill for the ‘coffee girl.’ I had no idea what he was talking about …”
“Calder?” I ask. My stomach drops so fast it leaves a cold spot in my middle.
“Calder Junior,” she says. “Mr. Welles calls him C.J. I guess I honestly don’t know what he prefers to be called …”
She nibbles the inside of her lower lip, her brows meeting.
“Anyway, here you go.” Marta slides a crisp fifty dollar note across the top ledge of her desk. “I assume it’s for dry cleaning?”
“I don’t understand …” I begin to say before biting my tongue. Why would he be so rude and then take the time to rectify it?
Marta blinks, studying me. “What don’t you understand?”
I force a smile. “Nothing. I guess I just didn’t realize who he was when we bumped into each other.”
“That’s too bad. I know Mr. Welles wanted to introduce the two of you as soon as possible, but it did seem like Calder was in a hurry when he left.” Her desk phone rings and she lifts a finger in my direction before taking the call. Her phone voice is saccharin sweet, almost motherly. She reminds me of my kindergarten teacher back in Riverside, though not in the looks department. She doesn’t have hair down to the small of her back, and she doesn’t smell like patchouli and sage.
Marta transfers the call before checking the gold-and-diamond-faced watch on her delicate wrist and returning her attention to me.
“It’s almost time for your one-on-one with Mr. Welles,” she says. “You have time to grab another coffee if you’d like?”
“Thank you, but no,” I say. I don’t want to roll that dice again today. “Where would you like me to wait?”
She mentioned something about setting me up with an office earlier today, but supposedly they were waiting on IT to install my phone and computer. I don’t quite understand why they’re treating me like I’m going to be here for the long term. I have my own laptop, and the only phone I need is my cell. And if I’m going to be busy running personal errands around the city most of the time, I see no reason for me to have a dedicated office.
Marta points to the cluster of leather chairs in the corner, and I head over to seat myself. A pitcher of cucumber water rests beside a row of neatly lined crystal tumblers. On the glass coffee table before me lie a stack of WellesTech’s official magazine, featuring Mr. Welles himself on the cover alongside the caption: “A Legacy Almost Thirty Years in the Making.”
I help myself to the top copy, paging through until I find the featured article about my eccentric employer.
Nearly thirty years ago, Calder Welles was working his way up the sales chain at a small-town Chevy dealership in upstate New York when a loan from his father-in-law changed everything …