Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 79833 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 399(@200wpm)___ 319(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79833 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 399(@200wpm)___ 319(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
She purses her lips. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Of course.” My nod is empathic. “I understand.”
“I’m making changes in the company,” Ms. Lewis says. “Unfortunately, budget cuts are necessary. You’ve come to the end of your probation period, and I’m afraid we’re not going to offer you a permanent position.”
Even though I expected the worst at Ms. Lewis’s presence, the dismissal still comes as a shock. “Is my work not up to standard? I know I’m lacking a formal qualification, but surely the accounts Mr. Lewis entrusted me with prove that—”
“You deliberately omitted the fact that you were pregnant when my husband interviewed you.” Ms. Lewis crosses her hands over her stomach. “He did you a favor by giving you a job you weren’t qualified for. The least you could’ve done was to be honest with him.”
I sit up straighter. “I’m not legally obliged to disclose that information.”
“No.” Ms. Lewis’s smile holds no emotion. “But it doesn’t cultivate mutual trust, does it?”
“You can’t dismiss me because of that,” I exclaim.
“I’m not.” Ms. Lewis watches me from under her lashes. “Not trusting you is a matter of ethics. I’m not giving you a permanent position because we’re downscaling.”
Ms. Price gives me a level look. “I’m here to confirm in my role as HR manager that Ms. Lewis is within her rights with the decision she made.”
“Please gather your personal belongings and leave the building immediately.” Ms. Lewis studies me as if I’m something unpleasant. “A security guard will escort you outside.”
Their judgement hangs thick in the air when I stand and walk with leaden feet to the door, not that I blame them. I feel the weight of their gazes on my back as I open the door and enter the smaller reception area where the late Mr. Lewis’s secretary sits. She observes me with the morbid fascination of pedestrians witnessing an accident, her eyes big behind her thick glasses.
Zack waits outside the door.
His presence cuts me with the sharpness of betrayal.
“You knew,” I say. “That’s why Ms. Price called you in last week.”
“She thought it would be best,” he says, not meeting my eyes.
“In case I resisted being thrown out?” I ask with a laugh.
“It’s nothing personal, just protocol.”
“Protocol? What am I going to do? Steal the stationary?”
He indicates with his arm that I should go ahead. “I’ll walk you.”
With nothing left to say, I go to my desk and gather my handbag and a few personal items under the curious stares of Jasmine and the other junior accountants. Armed with my favorite mug, a porcelain good luck cat that Livy gave me, my calculator, and a pencil case with my colored pens, I follow Zack to the first floor.
He doesn’t speak as he holds the door for me. No good luck and no goodbye. The door shuts behind me with a swoosh, a soft sound announcing that my short career here is over.
I stop on the sidewalk.
I gambled. I lost. I put my money on making myself indispensable so that my employer would overlook my dishonesty. Only, Ms. Price went out of her way to ascertain I’d only be charged with menial tasks, which, on the contrary, made me easily replaceable. Anyway, accountants better qualified than me are available by the dozens, all eager for an opportunity in an established firm.
I look up and down the street, a person without direction or purpose. Adrift. Saverio expects me to finish at five. It’s only eleven in the morning. A distant part of my mind says he’d want me to call him, but I’m like someone in shock who can’t think rationally.
I flag down a taxi, aware of Saverio’s men who get into a car parked farther down the street. I stare numbly through the window as we drive, taking in the scenery without seeing anything until the driver stops in front of Saverio’s house.
Before I can take my purse from my bag, one of the guards opens my door while another takes care of the bill.
I climb the steps to the front door on autopilot and walk like a zombie into the house. Hammering comes from upstairs. I drop the box with my belongings and my bag in the entrance and follow the sound to the room next to Saverio’s.
The bedroom is destruction personified. The panels are ripped off the walls, exposing the naked bricks beneath. Someone knocked out a part of the wall. Through the gaping hole, the main bedroom is visible on the other side.
Saverio stands in the middle of the broken panels and bits of plaster that litter the floor with a ten-pound hammer clutched in his hand. A layer of sweat shines on his naked torso, accentuating his hard, unyielding muscles as if they’ve been rubbed with oil. The veins that run down his arms and branch over his hands are embossed on his skin, drawing a picture of a gladiator in an arena who waits for the lion to be unleashed. White dust covers his ripped jeans and boots, and flakes of plaster are stuck to his hair. The hoop in his ear that I find so deliciously rebellious and sexy glitters as it catches the sunlight that falls through the window.