Chapter 21 Nina #2
“Why would he do that?” My voice was thin with mistrust.
“Well … he’s out of a job. That’s an option for not splurging on another fancy apartment.”
He’d resigned his coveted promotion to clear my name, and it’d made me furious he’d even had to do it in the first place. Old Lincoln knew and kept his mouth shut. Old Lincoln had fucked up. New Lincoln didn’t owe me anything, but he’d been giving so much regardless.
“He needs his place back. I should move out.” The words were out before I could stop them, a knee-jerk reaction, shoving away this …
this loyalty I didn’t want. His words of sorry I could take, keep at arm’s length.
Lincoln in my moldy apartment was an apology sinking into my bones.
I didn’t know what to do with it. It was too heavy, too real, too close to forgiveness waiting to happen.
“He doesn’t want you moving out.” Carmen’s voice was maddeningly gentle. “He wants you here and safe.”
Safe.
I gripped the edge of the counter so hard my knuckles whitened. Safe. The word was both a trap and a promise at the same time. Anger simmered, red and raging inside me. Who was he to decide I should be safe?
Carmen’s hand on my forearm kept the fury from boiling over into words.
It didn’t keep her feelings from spilling though.
“Maybe he’s decided that you should be safe.
” Her knowing, understanding eyes, held mine.
“But you get to decide if you believe he could change or what’s enough to say he has.
” She squeezed my arms. “He isn’t taking that away from you.
You get to figure that out on your terms.”
The man who got me fired. The man who’d lost me a scholarship. The man who stood back while his girlfriend humiliated me.
And yet.
My chest tightened until it hurt; what if Carmen was right? If I believed people could do better, why would Lincoln be an exception? I hated that my pulse tripped over itself at the thought.
It was pitch day. Lincoln had been true to his word, keeping me fed all weekend.
I’d been true to his word that I’d burn myself out working on it.
My presentation was damn near brilliant.
I also had copies on the cloud, on another cloud, and on two thumb drives, one in my tote, one in the pocket of my pants.
With my luck, we’d lose Wi-Fi, and I’d somehow be responsible for it.
I’d been on time, early even, and treated myself to tea to calm my nerves.
The line at check-in was longer when I got back, and by the time it was my turn, the staff was already rushing people through.
I was directed to the security system, where they scanned my bag and made me power on my laptop.
At the lockers, the attendant said, cheerful but firm, “All personal belongings” and pointed at the blue square doors.
He tilted his head toward my tote specifically, as if it looked particularly nefarious.
I hesitated for a second. Then I saw everyone else—at least a dozen people from five different teams cramming their coats, chargers, notebooks, purses, and phones into lockers without a second thought.
I followed suit, tucking my bag in, and shutting the door with a loud click.
We were then ushered to the left side and into a large conference room.
It was set up more like an arena than a meeting space. The clear message of “enter ye gladiators, prepare for your marketing deaths” delivered in the form of an elevated table holding three BrightMark execs, the projector’s glow throwing their profiles into a sharp shadow behind them.
I was about to sit down when I remembered. Shoot. My rescue inhaler.
My legs twitched toward the locker room, but I froze.
I hadn’t had a flare-up in almost two months.
Besides, if I went back now, under the watchful eye of a table full of BrightMark execs, I’d look like a mess who’d forgotten something.
My palms were already sweating; the last thing I needed was to draw more attention to myself.
I patted the USB in my slacks. I’d be fine. I swallowed hard. I’d be fine. I just had to keep my breaths steady.
Except my stomach was already doing slow, nauseating somersaults.
I caught a couple of big-name competitors as they laughed, and my heart thudded faster.
No chance against these guys. I’d take this as a practice run, a trial by fire, useful feedback in the form of gotcha questions, and I’d come out stronger.
I focused on the BrightMark execs. I’d memorized their names, faces, and education.
At the center sat Eleanor Channing, VP of Strategy, her steel-gray bob as severe as her reputation.
To her left, Annelisa Fletcher, Director of Innovation, leaned back with a lazy grin that dared anyone to impress her.
On the right, Priya Shah, Head of Analytics, tapped notes on an iPad, expression unreadable.
They looked less intimidating in pictures.
I turned around and saw him. In the last row, blond strands falling just over his eyebrows, those deep dimples looking more cute than cunning for once. He nodded, smiling, and I felt just a bit better about getting up there.
One by one, teams pitched, only to be sliced apart by BrightMark’s execs, each of their questions more cutting and incisive than the previous one.
They called a name I wasn’t expecting, and a flash of familiar red curls rose from the front row, followed by a head of ashy-blonde waves I’d stupidly let myself think of as a friend.
Her eyes found me instantly, she must have known exactly where I’d been the whole time.
She had the audacity to wink. Heat crawled up my neck, a sharp mix of shock and betrayal churning my stomach.
Carmen and Natasha stood side by side, looking readier than I’d ever felt.
Natasha sashayed up to the platform and offered her hand to the execs.
Only one of them responded while they directed her to the laptop set up to project.
Smoothing the front of her blouse, she clicked through a few menus and dragged her slide deck for everyone to see.
Then she froze. A chaotic mess of crooked text boxes and missing images. She tried to click through anyway, stammering about key points, but every new slide was worse than the last.
“That’s not right,” she muttered under her breath.
The next slide showed a pie chart of budget allocation, every slice was the same color, the labels nothing but “Segment 1,” “Segment 2,” “Segment 3.” There weren’t even numbers.
Just a sad, colorless wheel of failure. Lincoln chuckled from behind me, and I might’ve laughed too if the secondhand embarrassment curling in my chest hadn’t yanked me straight back to the day I’d lived through this myself.
“I think there’s something wrong with your slides,” Carmen said, her voice sweet but cutting.
She stood, smoothing her blazer. “It’s like somebody messed with them.
Imagine that!” Carmen cleared her throat.
“And I just can’t live through the mortification any longer.
Priya, dear, why don’t you pull up the slides I sent you? ”
Carmen’s deck appeared, crisp and perfect.
She took over smoothly, her confidence filling the room as she’d earned being on a first name basis with the execs.
She charmed Eleanor, cracked a joke that made Annelisa grin, and Priya rewarded her with a complicit smile. By the end, even I wanted to applaud.
“Well, that’s another firm’s presentation,” Eleanor said, her tone brisk. “Let’s move to our final contender. Last but not least, let’s welcome Nina Reyes, our sole independent contractor and one-woman team.”
My stomach twisted at the sound of my own name. This was it. I pushed to my feet, legs suddenly heavy, and walked toward the platform. My ankle boots made no elegant clicking, none I could hear over the roar of my own pulse in my ears.
“Wait just a minute.” Natasha’s voice cut through the room. She was standing again, chin lifted, eyes darting to the projector. “I’d like one more chance to make sure my original slide deck isn’t there somewhere. I’d hate for all my hard work to go to waste.”
Carmen’s smirk was slow, lethal. “Oh, you would, wouldn’t you? But it’s fine when it’s someone else’s work?”
I froze halfway to the platform, caught between them, heat creeping up my neck. Carmen’s brow arched, her look daring Natasha to double down. Natasha didn’t blink.
Eleanor’s lips curved in the smallest of smiles. “Very well, Ms. Dabrowski. If you can find it, we’ll give you three minutes. Impress us.”
The room seemed to lean forward as Natasha strode to the tech table, where the laptop sat connected to the projector.
Her red curls bounced with each step, defiant, and she crouched in front of the laptop with the confidence of someone who expected the universe to cooperate.
Click. Scroll. Click. Her honey eyes narrowed, darting across the screen, her jaw tightening with each failed search.
Two minutes in, her posture shifted, and her mouth twitched as if she’d just remembered a joke.
She turned back to the room with a little shrug. “Well,” she said casually, as if this were a cocktail party and not a career-defining moment, “looks like it’s gone. Guess I’ll just have to live with it.”
She didn’t look wrecked. She wouldn’t lose sleep over this. Not the way I had.
“Ms. Reyes,” Eleanor spoke in an even tone, “your turn, please.”
The person who’d pulled up all the presentations before waited for me to confirm the name of the file before projecting the screen. As soon as they were blown of the wall size sheet, it was clear. History was repeating itself.
Except it was ten times worse. A mess of text boxes and missing images. Except it had my name on them. Before I said anything, I moved ahead a few slides with the clicker and recognized the pie chart of failure.