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CHAPTER ONE
LIZ
My day starts with an interruption.
Okay, technically my day started hours ago. I’m dressed and showered, at the office and six e-mails (plus three coffees) into the morning. But if it weren’t for Cori, I would have just continued on in what I affectionately refer to as a “work coma” — the open-eyed but dead-brained state of dulled panic induced by my job from which only a glass of wine and an hour of reality television can fully pull me.
I’m currently thirty hours deep into a text conversation with a particularly stubborn potential client, Jefferson Reed. I’ve been on a thin razor of anxiety since I got my claws into him at a private gallery opening that I snuck into last week. He’s a big name with an even bigger bank account, and if I land his business then I’ll already be on my way to proving to Sloane Westing that she didn’t make a mistake in giving me a corner office and a fully functioning secretary.
Reed had me up half the night negotiating and somehow I’ve made it to dawn without a single dick pic or marriage proposal, which sounds like a joke but since my job is mainly making promises to men with more cash than common sense, it’s definitely not. This is a good sign. It means Reed is serious and not playing games. It also means buying a catering uniform to get me through the back door and quick-changing in a tiny bathroom stall was not a waste of my Friday evening. Not that I would have been doing much anyway.
I’m just sending a text claiming a final offer (and a third plea to do this over the phone like adults who wear expensive clothing to work) when my door flies open and Cori sticks her head in.
“Ms. Slate?” she whispers in case I’m on a call.
I jerk to reality so hard I drop my phone. It doesn’t go sliding across scuffed linoleum like it would have at my last job. It hits the plush navy carpet and sinks two inches into the fibers.
Cori and I both stare at the phone, then at each other. I should pick it up, but instead I pretend like I didn’t drop anything. Which probably makes it look like I actually was getting dick pics.
“What’s up?” I ask and then cringe internally. Real professional, Liz.
Cori is young, just out of college, and I’m the first executive she’s worked for. This means she doesn’t know what’s considered “odd” yet, and I’m not yearning to be the benchmark. To be honest, I’m just as unsure about this new relationship as she probably is. I’m close enough to touch my thirties, but she’s my first secretary ever. My best friend, Anna, says I’m moving up in the world; I’d settle for a wine of the month membership and an extra week of vacation.
Regardless, it’s too early for her to suspect that I have a few misplaced wires. So I force myself to bend over and pick up my cell like a normal person.
She’s about to speak, to tell me “what’s up”, when my eyes flick to the phone on my desk. “Wait, shouldn’t you be using the intercom?” I ask and immediately regret it. You should know this! Why are you asking her?
Cori finds the question strange, but not for that reason. “I did,” she says patiently. “I called you twice. Sorry, I wouldn’t have bothered you, but it’s important.”
As important as the five hundred million dollar account that I’m just about to snatch up? I don’t think so.
I humor her anyway. “Oh, sorry. I’m in the process of closing a big deal,” I say as an excuse for why my ears had stopped working.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Cori says again. “It’s just that Ms. Westing would like to see you in her office.”
My phone buzzes with Reed’s answer in my suddenly slack hand.
Oh. That is big. Could a summons to my new boss’s office come at a more inopportune time? Maybe, if the call came whilst a hookup was eight inches deep. Or if I were four hundred feet from the summit of Everest. In either scenario — and in this one — my response would be the same. Yes ma’am. Right away. Snap your fingers and your wish is my command. Anything else would be both disrespectful to one of the most powerful heads of finance in NYC and a sign that I obviously don’t appreciate this gorgeous office and my eye-popping pay raise.
“Sorry again about coming right in—” Cori starts, but I’m already shaking my head, standing and slipping my heels on. I clutch my phone, still not looking at the message.
“No, no. I’m glad you did. Could you please push my call with Saddler and Sons to ten o’clock. Oh and get my meeting with Hendrick to be over lunch if he can swing that,” I say as a dismissal. Who knows how long Sloane Westing will keep me. Or what she’ll be asking me for.
Cori leaves and I hurry into my personal bathroom, touch up my makeup, and steel myself, gripping the sides of the sink. I’d known that this was coming. I’m not just a new hire at the Westing Bank. I’m someone Ms. Westing wanted badly enough to poach from a competitor. She’d had her eye on me for a while and was more than happy to pad her offer with so many perks I would have been an idiot to say no. But now that I’ve settled in, the price for this position is going to have to be paid. The first real test of my skills — my value — is at hand, and I better be ready if I have a hot hope in hell of sticking it out in this industry until I’m old enough to reap the benefits of my 401K.
My mind drifts tantalizingly to Love Island and a healthy glass of pinot. I shake it off. Later. Maybe.
For now, coming into this meeting with a win is exactly what I need. I unlock my phone and read the text: Okay, fine. You’ve got me, Liz. I can come in this afternoon to sign the papers.
Yes! The excitement lasts a minute and then is tossed aside with all my other useless emotions. My day is packed, as always, and this meeting with the boss is stretching an already tight schedule like a waistband on Thanksgiving. But I’ll find the extra time. I always do.
I respond to Reed: Glad to have you on board, Jefferson. You won’t regret it. Have your people get in touch with my assistant.
I leave the bathroom, look around my beautiful new office. I want to stay here. There’s so much to be done. Too much. But I can’t. Keeping Sloane Westing waiting is not an option. I look into the mirror hanging on the far wall and square my shoulders, brush light brown hair out of my eyes, and nod firmly to myself. Compartmentalize. One thing at a time.
This is why you’re here. Because you’re good. Good enough to handle it all.
And I am. With this knowledge pulsing in my chest, a part of my heart, I push through the door and head upstairs to face Sloane Westing’s challenge.
