Chapter 28
CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT
AVA
There are thirty messages flashing on my phone when I walk out of the court room. Most of them look like they’re from work, so I ignore them and hug my mom, who’s going off for a victory brunch with Raeanne and their gang.
Being fined five hundred dollars and getting a stern talking to from the judge doesn’t seem like a victory to me, but hey, I’m not my mom.
And that’s okay.
It’s a short drive from the courthouse to work. There’s an empty space just outside the building and I grin as I steer into it. Some days are just good ones, and that’s how today feels. The sun is shining, my mom isn’t imprisoned, and in about three minutes I get to see Myles.
We spoke last night but we were both exhausted. He was one up on me, having done his laundry already. That’s tonight’s job, though I hope I’ll be able to squeeze it in around Myles, because he already told me he’s spending tonight at my place.
Matthew, the receptionist, grimaces at me as I walk in. “There’s a big argument going on up there,” he says. “That guy, the angry one. I think he’s riled everybody up.”
“That’s how he rolls,” I say lightly. Myles probably caught Ryan watching Netflix when he should have been working and laid into him. We’ve been away for almost a week, they’ve probably gotten into bad habits.
I pull the creaky elevator cage closed and hit the button for the third floor, and even though I spent the morning in court there’s still a smile on my face. Maybe we can finish work on time today and head for the park for a dinner picnic. The sun is too delicious to sit inside all evening.
When I step out of the elevator and into the office the room hushes. Everybody turns to look at me. They’re all gathered into a group by Ryan’s desk.
“I’ve been calling you,” Catherine says softly. “Have you heard?”
“Heard what?” I look around for Myles, but I can’t see him. The door to his office is closed and the inside is dark.
“New York has taken Dandy.”
I blink. “What?”
“I told you,” she says to Ryan. “She didn’t know.”
“What was I supposed to think?” He shrugs. “She disappeared for days with the enemy and then this happens. And she didn’t pick up your calls. Classic avoidance.”
I wave my hands in the air. “Can somebody explain what’s happening?”
“We got the email today,” Catherine says. “Naomi has agreed that Dandy can be transferred to the New York office. We assumed you knew.”
I shake my head. “I didn’t know anything,” I say. “Nobody told me.” And there has to be some kind of mistake. Naomi promised she wouldn’t take Dandy to New York. We have an excellent working relationship. If she was thinking about something like this she would have said something.
“Where’s Myles?” I ask, realizing he must know what’s going on.
“You tell us.” Ryan shakes his head. “He disappeared about twenty minutes before the email arrived. Didn’t say a damn thing, the sneaky asshole.”
I sit down heavily at my desk. My head feels woolly, like I can’t form a coherent thought. And I need to think right now.
Really think.
The first thing I do is boot up my laptop and read my emails. Sure enough, there’s the announcement in the form of a press release. Naomi Acre has signed a new contract and Dandy will be edited and distributed from the New York office.
Then I grab my phone and read my messages. Two missed calls from Myles plus two messages. I pull them up.
Can you call me when you get this message? – Myles
It was sent an hour and a half ago, when I was in court with Mom. I swallow hard and read the second.
Ava, please call me. – Myles
I take a deep breath. There has to be some explanation for this. I press his name on my phone to return his call and huff when it goes straight to voicemail. I leave a message and then send him a text, too, for good measure.
What’s going on? Did you know Dandy is going to New York? Why didn’t anybody tell me? – Ava.
“We’re going to lose our jobs, aren’t we?” Ryan says. “Dandy was the only thing that kept us in profit. Without him, they’ll close us for sure.”
“Christ.” Catherine drops her head into her hands. “I just bought a new house. I’m going to lose it.”
“Wait,” I say, because somebody has to. “Let me call Naomi. She’ll know what’s going on.”
I pull up her private number. Naomi doesn’t have a cellphone. She doesn’t like computers, either. She writes longhand and has her words transposed by a secretary.
The phone rings eight times before it’s picked up. “Hello, this is the Acre residence. Anna speaking.”
“Hi, it’s Ava Quinn,” I say. I’ve met Anna before. She’s Naomi’s housekeeper and the person who reminds her to eat when she’s caught up in writing. “Is Naomi there?”
“Oh, hello Ava. No she isn’t. She’s gone to New York for a meeting.”
Damn. “Do you know how I can contact her?” I ask.
“I’m not sure. She’s staying with some family friends. I can ask her to call you if she phones home? She’ll want to know how Artie is doing.”
Artie is her cat. And of course she’ll want to know.
“Yes,” I say. “Please ask her to call me.” I tell her my number and ask her to write it down. Naomi probably hasn’t taken her address book with her and I don’t want her to have any reason not to call back.
“I will, dear,” Anna agrees. Then she shouts. “No, Artie, not the cake.” She takes a deep breath. “I have to go. Artie and coffee cake don’t mix.”
“Of course. Thank you.”
“You’re very welcome.”
I hang up and stare at the phone for a moment. So Naomi is in New York. Which probably means she’s meeting with Mediatech. They’re making plans and talking about Dandy’s future and I’m not involved, even though I discovered him. It feels like a knife twisting in my ribcage.
“Ava?” Catherine says softly. “Are you okay?”
It’s only then that I realize I’m hyperventilating. “No, I’m not.” I feel betrayed and hurt and most of all I feel like I’ve let everybody down.
Ryan’s right. Without Dandy, this office isn’t going to survive. Dandy allows us to take risks on smaller authors. To work with schools and educators. That little friendly lion literally pays for the roof over all of our heads.
“Myles really didn’t say anything?” I ask her.
She shifts and I know there’s something she isn’t telling me.
“Catherine?”
She takes a deep breath and leans forward. “I was next to his office when he was on a call.”
“You heard what he said?”
She glances at Ryan’s desk – where everybody is still gathered, then back at me. “I didn’t want to make things worse by telling them.”
“Telling them what?” I feel sick. My stomach is literally twisting.
“He said that they weren’t supposed to be announcing it today. That they’d agreed to do it next week.”
There’s a ringing in my ears. The kind that you only get after a loud bang. For a moment I forget to breathe.
“Myles knew this was happening?” I whisper.
“I think so. I couldn’t ask him because he stormed out without a word. I guess he was hoping to be in New York when they announced so he didn’t have to deal with the fallout here.” She bites her lip. “Did he say anything to you on your retreat?”
“Nothing,” I whisper. He was too busy making me fall in love with him.
She gives me a tight smile, but there’s no humor there. Just a dark camaraderie that ties us together. We’re going to lose our jobs. And let’s face it, there aren’t a lot of openings in Charleston for children’s publishers. We’re the only one here, so either we retrain or we move.
Damn it, we were happy. I had plans. Myles knew that. He knew I’d need a job if I was going to be a single mom…
Christ. I could be pregnant now. Pregnant and out of a job and he didn’t say a word.
I look around the office. Ryan still has his cabal of mourners, all talking and shaking their heads.
In the corner, Ella the intern is crying on the phone – I imagine to her parents, poor kid.
Since Myles has disappeared to God knows where, I’m the highest ranking employee and I feel the weight on me.
The need to do something to help these people.
“Okay,” I call out. “Everybody, gather around.”
Ryan looks up, surprised. A few of them pause as though waiting for me to say something more.
“Don’t panic, I’m not going to fire you. I just want to talk to you all.”
Within a minute, they’ve formed a circle around me.
I look at their faces. Some are tearful, some are angry, some – like me – just look confused.
They’re faces I’ve seen every day, some of them for decades.
People who try to do their best, who try to make things that educate and entertain the children of America.
People who are scared because they don’t know what the future holds.
I take a deep breath. “I’m so sorry that you had to hear about this by email,” I tell them.
“And I’ll be letting New York know exactly how I feel about that.
And for those of you who are wondering, I had no idea either.
The first time I heard about this was when I walked through the door a little while ago. ”
That mollifies a couple of them. The others just grimace.
“But there’s something you should all know.
This decision doesn’t reflect the excellent job every one of you has been doing.
Dandy was ours. We found him, we developed him, we delivered him to the homes of children who fell in love with him.
And you should be proud of that. Because you made a difference in the lives of children everywhere.
You helped make this world a better place by promoting Dandy’s values.
Of kindness, of taking care of others, of treating people the way you’d like to be treated.
” I give them a soft smile. “And nobody can take that away.”
“They can take our jobs, though,” Ryan mutters. A few other people start talking.
I lift my hand. “I don’t know what will happen to our jobs. But I’m going to find out and believe me when I say I’ll push New York to make sure we’re all taken care of. I’m sorry this happened. I’m sorry I wasn’t aware of it and I’m sorry I didn’t get the chance to fight it.”
“You don’t need to be sorry, “Ryan says. “It’s Salinger who should apologize.”
“Is that why he was here?” Ella asks. “To steal Dandy?”
My throat tightens. The fact is, I have no idea. He said he was here to review the branch and make suggestions for improvements.
Could one of his suggestions have been to steal Dandy while I was busy falling for him?
It doesn’t feel like he’d do that. But then how well do I know him? I thought I did. I thought I knew everything about him, but if he can hide something like this from me then…
I don’t know him at all.
“As I said, I’ll be talking to New York. But in the meantime, I don’t think there’s a lot we can do. So I’d like you to do whatever is urgent in your inboxes, and at lunchtime you should all go down to The Hole in the Wall. I’ll make sure you’re paid for the day.”
“You want us to leave?” Ryan asks, looking confused.
“I want you to be together. To take care of each other. Us sitting in here staring at our screens isn’t going to help. Let’s get this out of our system then tomorrow we can work out what happens next. Okay?”
He nods. “Okay.”
“Good. So get your work done and get out of here. And tomorrow we’ll find out what the hell is going on.”