Chapter 1
April
“April, wake up now. Your butt is on the Internet.” Sid’s panicked voice cut through layers of fuzzy sleep to reach me.
I groaned and buried my head under my pillow. Yesterday, I’d asked my roommate to make sure I got out of bed on time this morning using any tactic necessary, short of ice cubes. I had no idea she’d resort to nonsense phrases.
“Sid, go away.”
Her hand was on my shoulder, shaking me. “No, seriously, you need to see this.”
“Don’t touch me,” I mumbled. “I can sleep five more minutes.”
“No, you can’t. April, there is a sex video from Comic-Con and I’m pretty sure you’re in it.”
I sat up, blinking, my vision blurry. “What the what?”
I’d gotten next to no sleep over the weekend, and with all the overstimulation, drinking and debauchery, I was flat as a pancake this morning, exhausted.
And I had to start my new position at Draco Multimedia today.
My eyes narrowed, cutting to my roommate. I’d accuse her of playing a joke, but Sid would never get so elaborate. Nor would she ever frivolously use the S-E-X word.
“Okay, back off and speak slowly. It’s before coffee o’clock.”
Sid sighed, obviously frustrated with my grogginess. “I was on Tumblr following the tag for Comic-Con, and this video of people having sex kept popping up. I kept closing it right away because—icky—who wants to see that? But one time I got a closer look at the girl dressed up in what looked like my elf costume—the one you borrowed.” Her voice was shrill like she was excited or panicked. Almost as effective as ice cubes for waking me up.
I swung a foot out of bed, still half asleep as her words rushed over me like a flash flood. There was this sick sensation in the pit of my stomach, and I had a feeling it had nothing to do with my rough weekend.
“Please tell me you’re joking.”
With wide gestures, Sid stalked over to her computer screen and angled it so that I could see. She pointed at the frozen figures. A woman, her back to the camera and naked from the waist down, was straddling a guy who sat on a chair. She had a distinctive tattoo at the small of her back, a hideous skull and snake motif.
Suddenly, my insides froze. My tattoo. My fit of rebellion from years ago now staring back at me from the screen, mocking me.
“So is that not you?”
I gulped. “Uh.”
“Holy Spock on a cracker! Apes, it’s everywhere. There are hundreds of reblogs on it. It’s on Twitter, Facebook, all over.”
I jumped out of bed, comforter and sheets falling on the floor and twisting around my legs, almost tripping me. “Nooooooo!”
Sid would be the last person I’d ever show this video to. She was pure as the driven snow. I was almost one hundred percent sure she was a virgin, and the girl sang—sang—while cleaning the house like Cinder-fucking-ella. And I bet when I wasn’t looking she got little animals to push her broom for her, too.
Unlike Sid, I had had sex before, though I was no expert at it. And the one time I’d ever done anything on the wild side to prove I could be a bad girl—like anonymously hooking up and making a video of it—somehow it ended up everywhere. What the hell was up with that?
My body came alive with panic and fear, adrenaline coursing through my veins and nausea twisting my gut. This couldn’t be happening! Not today! Not any day, but definitely not today. Without my asking her to, Sid clicked on the play button and I was treated to an unobstructed view of the hottest sex I’d ever had in my short twenty-two years.
I stood rooted to the floor as I watched the entire thing play out. I’d been drunk, but not so drunk I hadn’t realized what I was doing. My judgment suffered greatly when I drank, as evidenced by this crazy sex tape and the aforementioned tattoo. With tears prickling my eyes, I vowed I was never going to have another drop…ever. Because next time, with this progression, the world would probably cave in on itself if I drank.
Or maybe just my world.
I put the heels of my hands to my temples, my fingers threading into my hair.
“Earth to April…did someone revenge-porn you or something? What’s going on?”
I took in a shaky breath, unable to believe what was happening. “Oh God. Oh God. Oh God. This is a nightmare.”
“Did you have sex at Comic-Con, April?”
I turned and gave her the best “duh” look I could muster. Her mouth formed an ‘o’ and her brows rose. She sniffed with disapproval and adjusted the heavy black frames of her glasses. “Uh, who was it?”
Crap, my answer was only going to make things worse. My mind grasped for purchase on anything I could possibly think of. “Uh…um.” Think fast. Come up with something, damn it! “It was…he—”
“You don’t know, do you?”
Oh God, I was the worst “bad girl” ever. I swallowed bile as I waved a wild hand at the computer. “Delete that!” She was the geeky one, after all. She spent hours in front of the computer. She’d know how to make it go away.
Sid frowned. “I can’t.”
Now the sickness inside was bubbling up. Sid wouldn’t lie about this to teach me a lesson. “What…why? Why the fuck can’t you?”
“Because, potty mouth, it’s not my account. It was uploaded by someone else and tagged #ComicCon. I’ve been following the tag since, um—you know, unlike you, the undeserving non-geek—I didn’t get a chance to go. And that’s a good thing, because it seems like a den of iniquity!”
Uploaded by someone else? How in the hell had that happened? Had I accidentally uploaded it to the cloud? What the hell was “the cloud” anyway, and how did it work? Had someone hacked me like those poor actresses who’d had their naked pictures spread across the Internet?
I was going to vomit. Projectile puke everywhere.
“Did I…did I upload that from my phone?”
“So it’s your video? April! Why would you video yourself having sex with some random guy? And how could you not know who he was?”
“He was dressed up as that bounty hunter guy from the game—”
“Falco.”
“Yeah—whatever. Anyway, he had that armor on, and the helmet. And…and…” My stomach churned. “Oh hell, I’m going to barf.”
“Too much alcohol, April!” Sid shouted after me as I bee-lined it to the toilet.
Vague memories filtered in. It was the last night of Comic-Con, a mere two days ago. Even in my drunken haze, I remembered that the sex had been incredible. Heated breathing, sweating through my elf costume, the feel of skilled hands sliding under my clothes, squeezing my hips so tightly they’d been sore the day after. He’d only spoken in whispers and that had made it all the hotter.
That steamy encounter, along with the alcohol, had helped me forget for a while. Before that night, I’d been miserable the entire time because of the awful news I’d received the day before. I blinked stinging eyes and pushed it out of my mind.
Damn it. I gripped my belly, waiting, but nothing came up. Instead, my guts were cramping into tighter knots. It was my first day working as an assistant in the CFO’s office, and I had to start under these circumstances? What if people at work had seen the video? What if those who knew my costume figured out it was me? The questions swirled in my mind, making me dizzy. How would I even be able to concentrate today?
I stumbled to the sink to splash cold water on my face, and icy droplets soaked my temples, running down my neck and into my nightie. Then I confronted myself in the mirror, examining the blotches on my pale skin, complete with new dark circles under my blue eyes. Above the eyes, there were perfectly arched eyebrows, thanks to my makeover before the Con. I combed through my dark brown hair. I looked like hell. Felt worse. How had I gotten into this mess?
Oh yeah, I’d gotten drunk to drown out the humiliation and had let that affect what little good judgment I had—yet again. Alcohol and April clearly did not mix and were a dangerous combo. They led to ugly tattoos and anonymous sex with a helmeted man who had a ridiculously large penis and the hardest abs I’d ever felt against my body.
I’d been at Comic-Con because of my job, and he’d been some Dragon Epoch-loving nerd that I’d picked up because that’s what nice, boring, docile little April would never do. She’d never go find some random dude in a costume and fuck his brains out. But drunk April was no nice girl.
I was like Dr. Jekyll and Miss Hyde when it came to booze, apparently.
Ten minutes later, after jumping in the shower and toweling off, I went back into our bedroom. Sid was still at her computer, gaping open-mouthed at the monitor.
“Umm,” she mumbled when I stopped next to her. She was watching the goddamn thing again.
“Shut it off. That’s just getting creepy with you looking at it over and over.”
“This isn’t the video—this is a gif that someone made from the video.”
I knelt in closer, staring at the animated gif of my pelvis gyrating over the guy’s muscular legs as he dug his fingers into my hips—on repeat. A flash of heat went through me as I recalled how amazing he’d felt. My remembered pleasure evaporated the second oscillating letters appeared above us, reading, “Cosplay geeks mating in the wild.”
Shit…this was getting worse and worse.
I straightened. “Close that goddamn thing or I’m going to put a Trojan virus on your computer!”
Sid gave me a pitying look as I turned and headed to my closet. “It’s a Trojan or a virus—not both.”
“Whatever. Now please tell me you have some ideas about how to get that thing off the Internet.”
“How on earth would I do that?”
I froze, my hand on my smartest business skirt and matching crop sweater. “You mean, you can’t?”
“April, the thing has gone viral. There are memes, gifs. It’s all over social media. Were you not listening? It’s everywhere. There’s no way I can get it off.”
I sank to my bed, still wrapped in my towel. My stomach took a nosedive toward my ankles. I rubbed my forehead, trying to stave off a stress headache. “Shit.”
Sid swiveled her desk chair around to face me. She was petite and cute as a mouse, with olive skin, dark hair and eyes like polished onyx framed by dark glasses that overpowered her face. She folded her arms across her modest chest and raised a thick, dark brow at me.
“You know, it really isn’t that bad. No one could possibly know it’s you. You’re dressed up as Princess Alloreah’la from Dragon Epoch—purple wig, pointy ears, thick glitter makeup on. I doubt even the guy you…um…you know…even knows who you are. And he has a helmet on, and you both have most of your clothes on—except for your butt. So the odds of people knowing who it is are slim.”
“Well…thank God for that. But still…”
With my leg, I scooted aside a stack of economic theory books—my latest passion—laid the outfit on my bed and went to my dresser. Doubtful my friends who knew about the cheesy tat were the type to follow the #ComicCon tag on social media. I may have been “bookish” and “boring,” but I wasn’t a video game geek. And I usually kept the damn tattoo covered up. I was biding my time until I got the courage to get the hideous thing lasered off.
Biggest mistake of my life…
Okay, maybe second biggest mistake of my life. I sighed.
“So…how long does it take stuff like this to blow over?” I asked, bending over to grab a fresh pair of panties and a bra. I held the panties up—dark blue lace—and decided against them, shoving them back into the drawer and pulling out a thong. This skirt showed every single panty line. So weird that my mind was grasping, beyond the panic, to find some sort of normalcy, nitpicking every item I chose to wear. But I knew I had to try to shove this cosplay humiliation behind me somehow and hope against hope that this would soon fade away.
Scarlett O’Hara always said, “Tomorrow is another day,” but for me, “tomorrow” was going to start in about thirty minutes. I had to get my shit together, or at least act like it was together. Being moved up to work with an officer of the company was a huge honor for an intern. I needed his recommendation to get into business school, and I wasn’t about to blow it. Not now. I’d worked too hard for too long.
“No. More. Alcohol. Ever,” I intoned to myself as I sat on my bed and pulled on my clothes.
Sid snorted from where she sat behind her computer. “I’ve heard that one before.”
I stuck my tongue out at her, though she couldn’t see because her back was to me.
“Who knows what STD you picked up on this escapade?”
I grimaced at her. “He had a condom on, idiot.”
“Oh, well then. I guess that makes it all okay.”
“Sid, please,” I begged, pulling on my boots.
She spun around again on her chair, hands on her hips and affecting that motherly tone that she liked to use. “April…walk me through this, please, because I’m really confused. Doing something like this is so not you. Did aliens abduct your brain? Because, ya know, Comic-Con would totally be the place for that.”
I blew out a breath and leaned back against the wall. “My mom called me while I was there.”
Her face fell. “Oh, criminy. And what did the Wicked Witch of the West Coast want?”
I clenched my jaw, fighting off the renewed feeling of hurt. “She was calling me from Las Vegas, actually. She got married. Again.”
Sid’s eyes widened. “Oh, holy poop. For the fourth time? You barely had a chance to meet the last husband before it was over…” Then she seemed to remember one key detail—thank God, because I had no desire to spell it out for her. “Oh no…please don’t tell me… she didn’t—”
“She and Gunnar are now man and wife,” I choked out. “Isn’t that just sweet?”
Sid’s face reflected pure pity. It would have made me utterly furious to be on the receiving end of that look from anyone but her.
Yeah, I was that loser. The one whose ex-boyfriend married my mother—that same mother who didn’t have the wherewithal to figure out that it might hurt my feelings, nor would she care if she did realize it.
The term “mother” could only be applied to her in the most scientific of ways, in that she carried me for nine months and then gave birth to me. Jennifer Alden probably hadn’t had two thoughts together in the same day about me from that point on.
“I’m sorry, Apes. He’s such a—such a—”
“Cock smooch?”
“Bad person! I hate him. And your mom sucks too.”
I raised my brow. My sweet Sid was very pissed to have used such vulgar language. Or maybe it had been my bad influence. April Weiss, the worst “bad girl” ever was now corrupting the purest, sweetest person I’d ever known… I blinked, suddenly overwhelmed again, my eyes stinging.
Her head tilted. “Oh, Apes. Please don’t cry. Ugh…if I were the violent type, she’d be in trouble. I’ve always hated the way she uses you. Like when she takes you on shopping sprees and pressures you to pick up the bill. She’s so gross.”
I forced myself to swallow the unshed tears and started stuffing essentials into my new Kate Spade bag—my laptop, phone, wallet and, of course, my e-reader for break time.
Sid watched me with concerned eyes. I could feel the weight of her gaze. When I straightened, my eyes met hers. She spoke with soft, sympathetic tones. “So after she called you…you went to the bar, got wasted and picked up Falco the Bounty Hunter?”
“Not…exactly.”
She raised a brow, wordlessly encouraging me to continue with the whole sordid story. I figured I’d better let it out now. Like ripping off a bandage—get the pain out all at once. I sighed in surrender. “I was at the bar downing one vodka gimlet after another, and the other interns wanted to know what was wrong.”
“The ‘other interns’…meaning Queen Meangirl?” We shared a look. Sid had met Cari once and they had not gotten along. It was understandable. Cari was an acquired taste. And many didn’t acquire it. Sid continued, “She is a mean girl. I don’t know why you hang out with her.”
“I’ve told you, it’s for survival purposes. She’s the type of person I’d rather have on my side instead of against me. Besides…I think some of that is just her own issues. I feel sorry for her because her twin brother was killed. It’s so horrible.”
Sid nodded. “Nobody deserves that, I agree. But sometimes I don’t understand why you put up with her behavior.”
I looked away, heat rising to my cheeks. A good half of the time, I wasn’t proud of how I’d behaved when I was with Cari. I’d done things that I wish I hadn’t done. Things I’d like to make up for. This was one of those times.
“Anyway, with all the alcohol in me, I spilled to Cari why I was upset, and she was consoling me and even said Gunnar didn’t deserve me. Then she said I was a bit too goody-goody and that’s why I couldn’t hang onto a man.”
“That was not consolation, that was a taunt. And I’m guessing that in your drunken stupor you thought it would be a good idea to go out and prove to the world that you aren’t a goody-goody?”
Her accurate assessment of the situation showed how well she knew me. Though we’d attended different schools, we’d been friends throughout our high school years and had roomed together the entire four years at college, as well.
Sid had been a bit of a loner at her high school. She’d had a small group of friends, but they were picked on often. I, on the other hand, was a social chameleon who’d had a knack for appearing to fit in without actually fitting in. I’d adopted it at an early age—a child who never fit in anywhere needed that special tool in her kit in order to survive. But it turned out that fitting in often meant not being true to myself.
“Yeah, she irked me. And yes, it was probably on purpose, but I was feeling low anyway and there was this hot guy at the end of the bar in a full costume and helmet.”
“How could you tell he was hot?”
I rubbed my forehead. “He could have had a gorilla face under the helmet, I don’t know. But his body was pretty smokin’. He was tall and solid.”
“Did you talk much?”
I shrugged, trying to shove aside the panic and reason through the events of that night. I experienced again the cold thrill of sitting and talking with him, planning out what would happen next—anonymous sex, so unlike me, so dangerous. I’d rebelled against Cari’s words because they’d so closely echoed my mother’s words six months before. I hope my relationship with Gunnar isn’t weird for you…we’re just having fun. If anyone knows how to show a guy a good time, it’s your MILF-mama. More bile burned my throat at the humiliating memory of her words over the phone, of the tears I’d held in until she’d hung up.
“A little. We talked over drinks. I got silly and giggly, and then I invited him back to my room.”
“Why?”
I rolled my eyes. “To play charades. Why do you think?”
“April…”
I grimaced. “I hadn’t had sex in a long time. A woman has her needs. Please don’t get judgy or I won’t tell you what happened.”
“Well, I think from your starring role, I can see plain as day what happened. What I don’t get is why you recorded it.”
Sighing, I gathered my dirty clothes off the floor and tossed them into my hamper. “Because somewhere in my drunken stupor, I was all horny and hot for this guy’s bod.
And…I was excited, you know? I’d never ever done something like that before. So I thought, what could possibly make this encounter even more exciting? And it just popped into my head. I set my phone down and hit record. Then I attacked him where he was sitting in the chair.”
“You recorded the entire thing? Because the video is only five minutes long, and even I know that...well, that it must have gone on longer than that.”
“He said something about wanting to lay me down on the bed. I got up and turned the phone off.”
“And how the heck do you have no idea who it was? He never took his helmet off?”
“He was going to take it off, but I told him not to. I didn’t want to know who he was. It was more exciting that way. Then…when we moved to the bed, he laid me facedown, turned off the lights and took off the helmet. I didn’t look or try to figure it out. That’s the whole point of anonymous sex.”
Her eyes bugged. “Uh. If you say so. Was it…more exciting that way?”
Heat rose to my face at the memory of the weight of him, his hands and mouth at the small of my back, the feel of him pushing inside me. “It was.”
“Do you think he knew who you were?”
God, I hoped not. He’d be one more person to deal with over this viral video catastrophe. But there was no way…
“I was wearing the purple wig, and my face was all made up with that glitter paint you gave me. I’m pretty sure he’d never be able to pick me out of a crowd.”
“And he knows you recorded it, right?”
My stomach dropped and I stared at her, reluctant to admit it. “Uhhh...”
Her face fell. “Criminy, April. You made a sex tape and didn’t tell the guy you were doing it?”
I put my head in my hands, mostly to avoid her scrutiny. “I told you my judgment was crap. But I swear to God it wasn’t meant for anyone to watch. It was just a flight of fancy, like buying a cheesy souvenir after an awesome vacation. I planned on deleting it later.”
Her lips pursed like a disapproving grandma. “Too late for that.”
I straightened and looked at her. “Any thoughts about damage control?”
“The mean girls saw you hook up with Falco, didn’t they?”
I blinked, blearily remembering walking by the booth where they were sitting. I was holding hands with Falco and waving to them. “Yeah…if they see the video, they’ll know it’s me. But I think they’ll cover for me.”
They were my friends…at least on the surface, they were. I could count on them to keep my identity secret, couldn’t I?
Sid left her chair and sank down next to me on the bed, slinging an arm around my shoulders. I looked at her, my throat feeling prickly. What the hell was I going to do?
“You’ve got to stop letting her get to you like this.” I knew she meant my mom and not Cari. “And Gunnar—”
“Gunnar can suck it. I hope I never see him again.”
“But you probably have to now. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Chanukah—or do you do that one with your dad?” Given the choice, I’d do them all on my own. I stared into my lap, feeling utterly alone. Her arm tightened around my shoulders. “Gunnar is nothing to you—just brief, ancient history. You only dated him for like, what? A few months?”
“A year.” I’d met him at the end of my sophomore year and we’d dated through my junior year. My sorority and his fraternity were closely linked and people thought we were a cute couple…
She made a cutting gesture with her hand. “Okay, whatever. You weren’t even all that into him.”
“Did I—did I ever tell you what he told me when I broke up with him? That I was a boring little bookworm and too vanilla in bed. Asshole.”
She took a deep breath and let it go, likely grasping for something to comfort me with. “He was probably covering for his own insecurities. Your mother is the worst culprit in this. She should have realized—”
“She has no sense of anyone else’s feelings but her own. Even if I had said something, which I didn’t, she would fool herself into thinking that I’m totally and completely cool with her newest marriage.” And I knew that if I had said something, she would have called me selfish for intruding on her happiness. “I’m such a coward,” I groaned.
“You’re a peacekeeper, April. A child of divorced parents. It’s common, given your family situation. You never wanted to rock the boat because you felt like their love was conditional.”
“My mom’s ‘love’ is completely conditional. Dad’s just…never there. Thank God I have a friend like you.” My mouth tightened and I leaned my head on her shoulder. “You’re the bestest. I love you.”
“Love you too, chicken butt.”
“Stop calling me that.”
“Never.”
I brushed some lint off my skirt. I had to get up, get some makeup on and get going, but I was feeling really unmotivated at the moment.
Sid screwed up her mouth as if she’d eaten a salted lemon. “So…this makes Gunnar your step-dad now.”
That bad taste in my mouth was back. Our girlfriend moment was over. “Shut the fuck up, Sid.”
She shuddered.
I leaned forward and put my face in my hands, my elbows resting on my knees. “God… I need to get my head in the game. I have to start this new position at Draco today.”
“That starts today? Oh, suck an elf! I just remembered that. Could the timing be any worse?”
“Not really,” I mumbled into my hands. Working with the CFO was my dream position. A good evaluation from him could help me into any school I wanted to attend. Harvard…Stanford…or my first choice, UCLA. “I don’t think I’m going to be able to think about anything else but this…”
“Why don’t you concentrate on how jealous I am that you get to work at the place that makes my very favorite video game.” Sid was a gamer to the core, and had not stopped talking for days when I’d arranged for her to have a tour of the campus a few months ago. She played Dragon Epoch constantly and filled me in on the goings-on of the game even though I’d never really done much beyond dip my toe into the gaming environment. My interests lay elsewhere.
“You can keep your joysticks, Sid. I’ve got my books.”
Sid laughed. “Silly. Dragon Epoch isn’t played with a joystick!”
“Yeah, yeah. Whatever. I gotta get going. Please, if you can find a way to deal with this…?”
“I have no idea how it could have gotten uploaded unless you synced it to the cloud and someone hacked you.”
I sighed, wondering if I’d pressed the share button the one time I’d played it back for myself. Now that it was out, it was spreading like wildfire. My gut clenched with nausea again. Ugh. Uggity ugh.
I guess it no longer mattered how it had happened because the why it had happened was due completely to my own stupidity. Aside from the abstention of alcohol, I’d add getting a “dumb” phone to the list of things I had to do in order to atone. No more videos. No cameras. And no social media. Not anymore.
I stood and went into the bathroom to finish my makeup.
***
I pulled into the parking lot at Draco Multimedia Entertainment a good forty-five minutes early. The best way to show enthusiasm for the new job was to show up early, smiling and eager to get to work. And the harder I worked today, the more I’d be able to force the negative, panicked thoughts from this morning’s events to the back of my head. They nagged at me, swarming around my brain like gnats at dusk, and no matter how much I tried to swat them away, they came right back to aggravate me even more.
I’d been working at Draco for the past six months as an unpaid intern but had recently been given the opportunity for advancement—probably due to my hard work in marketing. And this position was primo. Rumor had it that the company would be listing for its initial public offering (IPO) soon, so I’d get to see a big part of the process from inside the office of the financial officer. Adding that accomplishment to my résumé would have the business schools bowing down and begging for me to attend.
Draco was situated in a unique castle-shaped glass structure lined with mirrored windows from the ground up. I liked the design, as it reflected the company’s mission—to provide a complete fantasy environment as the backdrop for its game. Inside was bright and airy with tall ceilings and an open-space floor plan divided by department. After entering the foyer, decorated with elaborate displays from the games Draco produced, I walked through my old division. Only a handful of the marketing people were there at this hour. There was no one I really knew, and most especially not the other interns, who usually slid in the front door a few minutes before the start of business.
I shook my head at the thought. They’d all been very good-natured but visibly envious of my new appointment. It felt good to be the subject of their admiration.
Usually it was me trying so hard to fit in that I went along with whatever the herd did. Especially Cari, the self-appointed leader of the group. Fortunately, she was nice to me, likely because my daddy was richer than hers.
Not that I really cared about that. I would have preferred a less-rich dad who’d spent more time with me and didn’t foist me off on my narcissistic mother. But people like Cari cared about that sort of thing, so I’d had an in.
The trick was all in the appearance of belonging, because I was never “in” anywhere. Social chameleon, always changing to blend into the scenery. That was me. But chameleons had a major flaw—they didn’t stand out. And in business, particularly in this new position, I would have to do exactly that. Make a name for myself so I could receive that coveted recommendation.
I pushed through the double doors that led to the wide atrium in front of the offices for the company executives. It, too, was quiet except for another intern assistant—the nerdy guy who worked for the CEO of the company, ultra-beautiful boy wonder, Adam Drake. Adam, like my new boss and most of the other officers of the company, was young, driven and mega successful from the start. At my age, he was already heading his own start-up company, which, within four years would become a multimillion-dollar business well on its way to going public. Hearing about his accomplishments often made me feel like a slacker.
“Hey, Charlie,” I said, stopping at his desk.
“Uh, actually it’s Charles,” he corrected, straightening his black hipster glasses on his nose.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I think I’ve been calling you the wrong name for months.”
He shrugged, sliding a slow gaze over my chest. I folded my arms to cover my breasts. The thought of being exposed in the video for all to see was still shaking me to my core. Every time it threatened to jump to the forefront, I had to put my head down and concentrate on the now. It was almost impossible to do.
Charles finally remembered where my eyes were. “It happens. But I figured since you’re going to be working up here for a while, best to set you straight now.”
I glanced in the direction of the CFO’s office. “Is, um, Mr. Fawkes in yet?”
Jordan Fawkes, my new boss, was even younger than Adam and had partnered with him to create the company. It was strange that I’d be more intimidated by them than if they were older, perhaps because their wild success served as a reminder of my own inadequacies.
Charles smiled condescendingly. “First off, none of the officers go by anything but their first names. It’s all casual here. And business casual dress,” he said with a pointed look at my smart skirt and sweater set.
I shifted where I stood and pushed my long hair back from my shoulder. “It’s the first day. There’s no such thing as making too good an impression,” I said, murmuring one of my ever-present aphorisms. I pinned quotes and truisms from my books all over bulletin boards and on sticky notes stuck to my computer monitor and bathroom mirror. They helped. They were like guideposts. My books were the mentors I’d never had in my parents.
“Anyway, Jordan usually gets here early, but since it’s the Monday after Comic-Con, you’d be doing yourself a favor to avoid him before noon. He’ll probably send you out to get his lunch for him. I have his standing Subway order.”
I tried not to scowl. Of course I said nothing, because in situations like this, I knew it was better to never show irritation or any other negative emotion. Grin and bear it.
But lunch errands? I wasn’t aiming to be a diner waitress. I needed good, solid business experience to write about in my admission essay. And I’d heard that Jordan Fawkes was a shrewd and savvy businessman. Word on the street was that the company owed as much of its success to him as it did to the CEO’s ingenuity at programming and virtual innovation.
Nevertheless, I was eager to please, and if I had to start with Charles and his condescending attitude to get by, then so be it. My new boss couldn’t possibly be worse than this little jerk.
“So should I do something? Maybe go in and straighten up his office or—”
“Dude—do not touch his desk or his stuff unless he asks. Just…wait over there.” He pointed to a waiting area with a comfortable-looking arrangement of deeply padded chairs meant for visitors and clientele while they waited to meet with the bigwigs. “You report to Susan, his paid assistant, and she isn’t in yet.”
I looked back at him. “Can’t I do something for you?”
He raised his brows. “Yeah, as a matter of fact…” I leaned in, anxious to get to work and impress my new co-worker. “I take my latte with skim milk and two sugars. And don’t go to our café. They suck. There’s a Starbucks down the street. Extra hot, mmkay?”
I straightened, resisted shooting him a glare, and with a bit of resignation in my slumped shoulders, turned around to carry out his orders. There was a pecking order here, and clearly Charlie-boy considered himself above me.
I returned twenty minutes later with his coffee and one for myself. This time, when I walked through the front, the marketing department was populated, and some of the interns I’d worked with waved and smiled. Cari raced toward me, her massive mane of blond hair trailing after her. She was wearing a provocative outfit—plaid, pleated mini-skirt that hit well above mid-thigh paired with a tight white blouse and knee socks. She’d referred to this outfit as her take on the “naughty school girl.” Professional it was not.
She took in my sweater set with a nod of approval. “You’re looking very grown-up today for your new position! How are you doing? Want me to help you carry that?”
I smiled, a little uneasy as I remembered Sid’s comments about her this morning. “I’m good, thanks.”
She threw a curious glance at me out of the corner of her eyes as she pushed the double doors open. “So, um, nervous? Everything going okay?”
I hesitated a moment and returned her look, slowing my pace. “Why do you keep asking?”
She grimaced. “I, um…well, I was going through my timeline this morning on Facebook…”
My hand carrying Charlie-boy’s ultra-hot scalding with the fire of a thousand suns coffee shook and a bit of it spilled out the top, burning the back of my hand. “Shit,” I said, but didn’t know whether it was because of the pain or the fact that Cari knew it was me in the video.
“Um. I don’t want to talk about it,” I muttered.
“I, uh…why is it on the Internet?”
“I don’t know. I must have pushed a button to upload it to the cloud or something. I have no fucking idea. And did I mention I don’t want to talk about it?”
I turned and started back to the atrium and Charlie’s desk, anxious to get this blistering cup of simmering lava out of my hand.
“So, what are you going to do?”
“I’m not sure there’s much I can do,” I said bitterly. But maybe there was… If I got Cari on my side, her loyalty would prevent anyone else from talking about it. So as much as her behavior of late had been distasteful, I was going to have to be her bestest buddy ever. Cari was fast becoming one big gnat I couldn’t bat away. I’d have to sweet talk and kiss up to this gnat, in fact.
“Can I, uh, ask you to cover for me with the others?”
Cari smiled. “Ingrid was the other one with us at the bar, and she was so drunk she doesn’t even remember that was you. I won’t say a word. I know you must be stressed out. I’ll do whatever I can to help. Let’s get together for lunch, okay?”
The feeling of relief came as a rush—I was almost giddy with it. Thank God I had Cari on my side for this. “That sounds great,” I said.
I didn’t fully trust her—had never fully trusted her. But she had no reason to rat me out, and she was smart enough to know it could backfire on her to do it. I’d find a way to keep the loyalty I’d won in her. Time for the chameleon to change her colors again.
Cari quickly peeled away from me before I entered the atrium, where I all but slapped that cup of white-hot neutronium on Mr. Hipster’s desk. I shook my hand out the minute it was free.
“Mmm, piping hot. The same way your new boss likes it,” Charlie chimed. “He’s here, by the way, and the first thing he grunted at me was a demand to get him a venti triple espresso, no cream, no sugar.”
I froze. He had to be fucking kidding me. But there was no cheeky smile incoming. Charlie jerked a thumb toward Jordan’s office. “Better hop to it, girlfriend. He’s hungover from partying all week at Comic-Con and not in the best of moods.”
Shit. Shit. Shit. This was already proving to be a fantabulous day. Goddamn it. I spun and walked back out the door, taking a long pull from my now tepid cup of coffee. Fantabulous and long-ass day.
Seriously, how could it get worse?