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My heart was pounding. I had too much on the table. If I lost even one paycheck, I’d miss making a payment on the most important thing in the world: my sister.
Not that we could afford the practically fourteen-thousand-dollar-a-month drug that the doctors said might save her life. We’d sold the family home in New Jersey to get this far, and I’d drained every penny I had from every account, and it was never enough. So I needed a promotion and a way to get more money fast, and that was why I was at my desk, focusing entirely on spreadsheets.
A message dinged, telling me to head to the boss’s office. I had zero clue about how to get any of what I needed. And I had no time to daydream about Kir Norouzi and how he would just offer me money even though we were acquaintances who’d walked on a romantic beach only once.
The real world didn’t work like that. The real world had someone like Jeffrey Lauglin, who was best friends with my boss, Richard Ziff. Happy-hour-friendly Lauglin badmouthed my social drinking.
I headed into Richard Ziff’s office, and they were both there. Mr. Ziff folded his hands across the table as he sat with a smirking Lauglin. “Why would this application be any different from the last time you applied for a senior analyst position a month ago?”
I’d rewritten my résumé to apply elsewhere after I was turned down for that position, and then I’d taken time off, gone to Hawaii, and had lust-filled fantasies about a muscular man with the strength to knock down both jerks with his pinky.
I lifted my chin. “Two things. Your reaction to my friend Kelly’s decision to not go out with Mr. Lauglin is against company reprisal policies and has no effect on my job performance.”
Ziff’s face went white. “You are a good analyst, Avril, but?—“
I needed to ask for this. If they said no, I had to find a new situation fast. “And second, I am now in a stable relationship. The fact that I was single before was the primary reason I was rejected.”
Lauglin’s face was red. “Congratulations. When did this happen?”
Who I was or wasn’t dating was not company business, but I didn’t blink as I said, “On my recent trip to Hawaii.”
He shrugged. “Vacation romances don’t last.”
I hate Lauglin. I tensed. “We met before the wedding, actually, and he’s not a fling.”
He had a twinkle in his gaze. “What’s his name?”
My hand shook, but I refused to blink. I’d come this far with my lie, so I inhaled and said, “Kir Norouzi.”
Ziff asked, “The trillionaire?”
“The same.”
Ziff nodded quickly. “We’ll set up a second interview for you after the office party.”
I stood. Once I had a job with the higher-ups, I would never see either of these men again. “Sounds perfect. Thank you.”
I walked out, returned to my desk, and finished my work. As I was leaving, I tried to call my sister, Abby, but she wasn’t answering.
As I walked away from the high-rise, my phone rang. I answered. “Britney, what’s going on?” In an old version of my life that didn’t consist of hospital payments, I’d have been heading right to the squad.
Britney said, “Kelly and I are getting cocktails. Join us.”
I stopped in my tracks in the middle of the busy street. “I can’t afford that.”
“I’ll buy. You’re having a shit time.”
I’d have gone bonkers without that trip to Hawaii to get my mind off Abby. My friends continued to save me. I glanced at the address on my phone. “I’ll come say hi.”
They were closer to work than I preferred, but I had a feeling Britney had set it up that way on purpose. She was always the one watching out for the rest of us. I headed to the local bar near Wall Street and the bank I worked at, hoping no one at work would find me there.
As I stepped inside, I saw the whole group except Hope. I hugged everyone. “Miley, Isabel, you came too.”
Britney pushed a drink toward me. “What’s going on?”
I closed my eyes. Having them to talk to meant everything. I took one sip of my pink cosmopolitan and sighed. It was my favorite. “So, good news or bad news?”
Miley, the lawyer, tapped the table. “I say start with bad so we can drink to the good after.”
