Chapter Five
Five
In the bleary light of morning, the events of the previous night felt like a bad dream. There was my blood, though, smeared across that business card. Shuddering, I stuffed it into a desk drawer and then went through the motions of getting ready for work. At least it was Friday.
The New York office of Dark Enterprises was housed behind a plain facade of black mirrored glass.
There was no sign out front, nothing at all to advertise what waited inside, and only those initiated into the corporate mysteries would notice that the geometric patterns incised into the gleaming metal of the revolving doors were actually composed of thousands of tiny sigils.
If anything dangerous walked into the lobby, those wards ensured that it would be sequestered and dealt with by Security.
I no longer noticed these precautions, nor the arcane markings around the elevators that would incinerate intruders if they tried to go anywhere without an employee escorting them.
The ID badge dangling from the lanyard around my neck was all the protection I needed.
Naturally, these security measures came with their share of downsides—every other week, someone forgot their lanyard at home and wandered onto the elevators in a caffeine-deprived haze, and then we were down to a single elevator for the entire building while Janitorial Services scrubbed the greasy, incinerated remains off the walls. It never stopped being annoying.
Today, though…did I imagine the chilly shiver of protective magicks sliding across my skin as I pushed through the revolving door and into the lobby? Was the woman sitting behind the imposing receptionist’s desk looking at me strangely? Was I marked somehow by what I’d done last night?
I was in a full sweat by the time I stepped onto the elevator, every muscle tensed in anticipation of a sudden and lethal inferno.
Nothing happened, though. The doors rolled shut with a cheerful ding, upbeat Muzak drifted from hidden speakers, and I reached Human Resources unscathed.
Nonetheless, a heavy, persistent feeling of dread settled over me as I tried to work.
I was increasingly certain that someone knew what I’d done.
The spreadsheets and quota reports on my computer screen blurred into irrelevance as I hunched over my desk and stared blankly into space, wondering when the axe would finally fall.
By the afternoon, I was so jumpy that when someone cleared their throat behind me I almost had a heart attack.
Swiveling in my chair, I found Ms. Kettering watching me with that friendly little smile that never quite reached her eyes.
“I’ve just had a call from the CEO, Colin,” she purred.
“You’ve been summoned to the thirteenth floor.
” Behind her, Beverly’s head swiveled in our direction, her mouth falling open to reveal that one dead tooth she always tried to hide.
I stared at my boss as I processed this.
Summoned to the thirteenth floor, and by the CEO, no less.
Could this be my promotion? Or was the Firing Squad waiting for me, ready to terminate my employment?
My heart started pounding with a nauseating mixture of fear and excitement as I considered these disparate possibilities.
“Uh. Okay,” I finally said. “Right now?”
Ms. Kettering nodded. “Don’t worry about the afternoon inspection, Colin.
I’ll find someone else to do it.” Her smile widened until I could see teeth.
That was almost more terrifying than being singled out by the CEO.
“Hurry, now,” she fluted as she stepped to one side with a whisper of flesh-colored pantyhose.
“You don’t want to keep Ms. Crenshaw waiting. ”
Everyone in the bullpen was watching me, I realized, some people actually standing up from their desks to peer over the cubicle walls. I headed for the elevators, my limbs wooden, my movements automatic. Either my dreams were coming true, or I was a dead man walking.
The last thing I saw before the elevator doors closed were Ms. Kettering’s teeth gleaming above her pussycat bow, a last predatory flash before I ascended to meet my fate.
Though we’d shared an elevator for at least twenty seconds three days ago, Ms. Crenshaw didn’t appear to recognize me.
Casually elegant in a charcoal pantsuit, she crossed her legs and watched me from the other side of her glass-and-steel desk while floor-to-ceiling windows on two sides of the room looked out across an aerial view of Central Park that defied both physics and geography.
It was a lovely office. Undoubtedly, she’d done terrible things to get there.
Seated in a chair on the other side of her desk, hands clasped together so tightly that my knuckles ached, I waited in silence, unable to hold her gaze for more than a moment at a time.
After an uncomfortable interval, Ms. Crenshaw finally spoke. “It seems,” she said, taking a folder from her desk and opening it, “that your performance in Human Resources has suffered a sudden and precipitous decline.”
Oh no. This was my exit interview. “I can explain,” I said around a tongue that felt too big for my mouth.
Her head tilted to one side. “You’re going to tell me this is the fault of Mr. Chandola.”
“Sunil. Yes. He’s been sabotaging me. Doctoring my reports.”
“I see.” Closing the folder and tossing it back onto her desk, Ms. Crenshaw leaned back in her chair. “What would you do to Mr. Chandola if he were here?”
I blinked at her. “I don’t understand.”
Elbows on her chair’s armrests, she steepled her fingers together. “This is someone who is trying to force you into early retirement. Someone to whom your life—your very existence—is meaningless.” She watched me dispassionately. “If you could do anything to him, what would it be?”
“I…I don’t know.”
A fleeting expression of disappointment crossed her face. Bending forward, she reached for the sleek phone on her desk.
“Wait!” I swallowed thickly. “I…I would make him beg. On his knees.”
Her hand paused above the phone.
Struggling with myself, I went on, the words coming easier the longer I spoke.
“I would grind his face into the floor until he apologized. Until he meant it. Then I’d travel back in time and change the course of his entire life so he winds up working as a telemarketer, screamed at all day by strangers while barely making enough to afford the rent on a mold-infested basement apartment in a tiny, boring town hours away from anywhere, his soul shriveling day by day as he wonders where it all went wrong.
And then I’d show up and tell him it all went wrong when he messed with me in an alternate timeline, leaving him devastated and wishing he were a better person for the rest of his sad, miserable life.
” My chest was heaving with a mixture of adrenaline and savage exultation by the time I finished.
“Inventive,” Ms. Crenshaw observed as she leaned back in her chair.
Lifting one hand, I wiped away the sweat beading on my forehead. “I’ve thought about it a lot,” I said hoarsely.
“I’m glad to hear it. That’s the kind of attitude we like to see here. Uncompromising. Vengeful.”
I fought to get my breathing under control. “You’re not angry with me? I’m not being…terminated?”
“Not at all. In fact, right now you’re interviewing for a position as my assistant.”
I stared at her.
“My last one imploded this morning,” she added, “which is inconvenient.”
Slowly, I nodded. I was sure it was.
A long silence fell as Ms. Crenshaw studied me. “What do you want more than anything, Colin?” she finally asked.
I didn’t hesitate this time. “Power.”
Her eyes were cool and watchful. “Why?”
“Because people with power aren’t bullied or ignored or overlooked.
Because I want to do more than sit in a cubicle and enter data.
I want to put a mark on the world so deep that no one will ever forget me.
” I swallowed convulsively as I thought of Sunil.
“And because there are people who need to pay.”
For the first time, Ms. Crenshaw smiled. “Wonderful,” she said. “I think you’ll do well here.”