Chapter 23
Chapter
Twenty-Three
Angelica hung up the call and sighed heavily. She’d had a suspicion about Julian, and she’d wanted to follow it, no matter what. And she had. And, unfortunately, she’d been right.
Sexual harassment.
And no one had taken it to the police. He would simply run through employee after employee, and then get new ones.
No consequences to his poor behavior. Nothing.
But now she was left with the problem that she wasn’t entirely sure what to do with this information or how to make it all come out in her favor in the end.
Rex knocked on the conference room door and stepped inside, nodding at her. “Josef would like more conflict.”
“Of course he would,” Angelica mumbled under her breath.
She’d worried that would be the party line as soon as she found out that he was showing up for this episode. Something about the reports he’d been getting told him there wasn’t enough of her and Hope fighting in their previous episodes. Angelica rolled her shoulders.
“So, what’s your plan for that?”
Rex shook his head. “No idea. Hope’s not on board with it.”
Well, that was good to know at least. She hadn’t had a moment to sit down and talk with Hope yet.
Not that she was avoiding doing that either.
The way they’d left the conversation two days ago still didn’t sit right with her.
She didn’t want Hope to think that just opening up her marriage was going to be as easy as she made it out to be.
“Josef won’t let it go until he gets what he wants.” Angelica squared her shoulders. “We could create drama by inviting some former employees back to confront Julian on his bad management style.”
Rex wrinkled his nose. “I’m not so sure about that.”
Angelica wasn’t either. Putting victims right in front of their perpetrator wasn’t exactly something she wanted to do either. Re-traumatizing people wasn’t at the top of her list. Still Josef would want some drama for the cameras.
Julian stepped into the doorway, his eyes not leaving Angelica as soon as they landed on her. He was quickly followed by Josef, who looked nothing more than the bumbling idiot, following the golden child to clean up after him.
Perfect.
This was going to be far more of a battle than Angelica had thought it would be. She crossed her legs and arms and took on an air of annoyance as she waited for Julian and Josef to sit down and tell her everything she was doing wrong already. Because surely they would.
The cameras were already on in the room, so she knew something was about to go down.
And Rex stepped away from the table, indicating that this was a scene about to be filmed and she hadn’t been told anything.
Why did Rex let Josef get away with this bullshit so much? He really should hold his own better.
“I thought we could talk about the bar,” Julian said, sitting next to Angelica. “And just how to improve on the issues we have there.”
“Issues?” Angelica raised an eyebrow at him, pursing her lips. As far as she knew, the issue was him and nothing else. She’d been filled in on his behavior both since she’d arrived and before, and she now knew exactly what she was dealing with.
Julian leaned forward and then back, settling into his chair. But his leg was way too close to Angelica for comfort. She glanced at Rex, who was now sitting behind the monitors with Josef and not paying enough attention to what was happening.
“Shouldn’t Hope be here for this conversation?” Angelica asked, using the last line of defense that she had.
Rex popped his head around the monitors. “Do you want her here?”
“Yes.” Angelica didn’t even have to think about that. She didn’t care if she and Hope were at odds right now, she needed the added buffer immediately. “Please,” she added at the last minute.
“We don’t need Hope.” Julian dropped his hand onto Angelica’s knee, squeezing gently.
Angelica’s stomach churned instantly. She stared down at his hand, debating what the best course of action was. She could remove it, or she could stand up and walk away from him. She could storm out and scream and yell. She could do so many things, but she was frozen to the spot.
Had she been touched like this by a man before?
Yes.
But it hadn’t happened in a very long time. And still, she’d told herself when it did happen again, that she’d react differently than before. And she wasn’t. She was stunned into doing nothing.
“Hope was present when there was the incident in the bar.” Angelica looked at him directly. “So we do need her. And the bar is under her purview, not mine.”
She slid her knee out of his reach, and his hand dropped.
When Hope got there, she’d be sure to scoot closer to Hope to avoid being so close to Julian.
At least that way, she’d have a bit more protection from him.
Angelica realized belatedly that her shoulders were tight and raised up, nearly to her ears.
She purposely dropped them down and pulled her iPad over so she could pull up the finances for the bar.
She’d never dealt with a bar quite as extensive as the one here, which made sense all things considered.
And she’d never been hands-on with a casino before.
But the casino was the only reason that Julian was managing to stay afloat financially.
They’d applied not because of financial drain but because of the turnover in his employees and low customer satisfaction.
She knew why.
But she could also see where he wasn’t maximizing the potential of the rest of the hotel, all the different parts of it, which meant that he wasn’t making nearly as much money as he could.
Angelica clenched her jaw, her molars grinding against each other as she flipped through the financial records and statistics.
Hope finally arrived, seemingly confused. But she sat down next to Angelica and leaned over the table. “We’re talking about the bar?”
“Yes,” Angelica said, relaxing slightly because Hope was finally here. She kept her back to Hope and her front to Julian so she could face him down. “Looking over the numbers, you’re losing money at the bar.”
“Because my staff is clumsy.” Julian laughed lightly, as if this entire process was a joke.
“No, because they’re overpouring drinks and because they’re using the high value alcohol instead of the wells.”
“What?” Julian at least seemed genuinely surprised by that.
“When they were interviewed,” Hope jumped in, “they didn’t know it was against policy.”
“And when I dove into policy, it’s not in there,” Angelica added. She and Hope were good at tag-teaming like this. She wished they could do it more often. “Further, they’re overpouring drinks because they’re untrained. They shouldn’t be at the bar by themselves.”
“That’s because I’m so short staffed.”
Angelica was about to tell him why that was when his hand landed on her knee again.
But with the way she was facing and the table, there was no way Hope would be able to see what he was doing.
And instead of just leaving his hand there, he started to move it up her thigh, brushing his fingers against the inside of her leg in small circles.
Fuck.
“It is in part because you’re short-staffed,” Hope said, shooting Angelica a confused look. “But that’s why we need to solve the real problem behind why that’s happening. Are you up for that task?”
God, now Hope was trying to take over where Angelica would normally hardball it because she wasn’t capable of speaking right now. She couldn’t say anything. She couldn’t move. She could barely even breathe.
“Of course,” Julian agreed. “When do we get started on that?”
“How about tomorrow morning?” Hope looked at Angelica, sending her another confused glance. “Does that work for you?”
“Y-yes,” Angelica stuttered. She pushed back her chair and stood up. “In the morning.”
She made it to the doorway, but Josef’s hand on her arm spun her back around.
“What the hell, Ange?” He nearly splattered his anger in spittle all over her.
Angelica shook her head at him and then stepped in closer. “Did you see what he did?”
“He didn’t do anything.” Josef glared at her.
“He grabbed my leg, Josef.”
“No, he didn’t.” Josef tightened his grip on her arm. “And even if he did, what does it matter to you? You don’t swing his way, Ange.”
God, she wanted to puke. She shook her head at him. “You know, I thought you couldn’t get any worse, but you’re only proving how much of a conceited asshole you really are.”
She ripped her arm from his grasp.
“I’ll see you in the morning.” She spat the words at him before retreating out of the conference room.
She needed a shower, immediately. She needed to get the feel of Julian’s nasty hand off her skin in any way possible.
Angelica walked straight to the elevator after dropping her microphone in the main staging area.
She was done for the day. Screw Josef. Screw Rex.
She wasn’t going to do anything else tonight for them.
She made her way up to her room. As soon as she was inside, she immediately locked the door and put the deadbolt on. Angelica turned around and stared at her room, clean, neat, and everything in order. She breathed slowly, calming her racing heart.
She needed a plan before she went back down there and dealt with Julian again.
And unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on which way she looked at it—he didn’t seem interested in Hope in quite the same way he was interested in her.
Which now led her to question whether or not all those previous employees had something similar to her… like blonde and busty.
Screw the shower. She needed to run this off and think while she did that. Because her mind wasn’t going to quiet down until she came up with some sort of solution to this problem. Rolling her neck, Angelica stopped in the bathroom to grab a hair tie and pull her hair up into a ponytail.