Page 39 of Promise of Destruction
After the way he came on so heavily, it’s almost… strange when he makes himself scarce.
It’s not until Friday, when he brings bagels to the conference room, when I begin to doubt whether this is worth it again. Everyone gathered around the spread immediately, helping themselves to breakfast. In the months I worked under Eric, we never had breakfast provided, and they've enjoyed everythingDeclan’s brought in. I, on the other hand, have made it a point not to take anything from him.
It's a stupid thing to do, really, when you consider I'm happily taking his money. But hisfood? I'd rather starve than let him see me take something he's offering 'out of the kindness of his heart'. Unfortunately, he seems to have noticed as much.
I'm scrolling uselessly through the phone I broke since the one he gave me is probably loaded with spyware, my sore fingers be damned, when I hear him. "Miss Palmer?"
I set my jaw and let a slow breath out before glancing up to see him standing before the table, holding a bagel out on a plate, sliced right down the middle.
"I hadn't planned to add delivery to my resume." He chuckles, prompting a few of the fellow staff members to follow. "Butter or cream cheese?"
"Neither, thank you." I turn my attention back to the phone I really wasn't looking at to begin with.
"No spread? If this is how you prefer it..."
"No, thank you." I snap. "Not hungry."
"Coffee, then?"
"Already had some today."
And I'm sure he knows it. His absence from my life the past few days made me keenly aware of the car parked across the street this morning, in the house that's been abandoned for months. I did a fabulous job of not looking his way, pretending that I wasn't on to him, but when I backed out of my drive and eased onto the road, I saw from the rearview mirror as his car eased out after me. I stopped for my coffee at the local shop, where the same woman has been working all week and has begun to remember my name, and lo and behold, the Mercedes turned into the parking lot behind me. I felt his eyes on me as I walked in, and like magic, he was there when I turned to go with my coffee in hand.
He made it out to be some cosmic coincidence, but the smirk on his infuriating lips told me otherwise.
"But I ordered this flat white just for you."
His eyes glitter as if he's learned some big secret about me and not just how I take my coffee. "Luc will drink it." I offer, glancing at my one remaining friend in this place.
I haven't leveled with him about Declan stalking me... we aren'tthatkind of friends. And besides, I don't feel like it's information Icanshare with anyone, NDA aside.
What would Marissa and Khan say if I told them? Tell me to quit, to get a restraining order, that I brought this upon myself with that hit piece? Besides all of the above, this doesn't feel like the sort of thing I should share with anyone. Granted, it may be worthwhile to let someone know or maybe keep a diary in the event that I go missing. But at the same time, this feels... personal. He's paying me for my compliance.
I'm not dumb. The contract didn't say anything about him having a right to stalk and terrorize me, sure, but if I go running to the police now before anything has happened, what will they do? Laugh? Tell me I brought this upon myself? Assume I'm a gold-digging whore who's just changed her mind about the attention she pretty much agreed to receive?
Luc's eyes flit from me to Declan, sensing that something strange is afoot. He doesn't say anything, and Declan doesn't so much as turn his way. "You haven't been sleeping well. The extra caffeine will help perk you up."
If anyone other than Luc finds that statement odd, they don't show it, content to munch on their bagels and sip their coffee and assume their new boss isjust so gracious. I want to stab him in his beautiful face with the fancy fountain pen he made me sign my contract with.
Instead, I force a smile and hold my hand out to take the coffee. And that's all I do, refusing to drink it as he launchesinto a summary of all the developments that took place this past week, explaining how he basically saved our company from demise.
Such a fucking hero.
When he dismisses us, I'm first out of my seat, eager to get out of this room, to get out from under his gaze. Unfortunately, we share an office, so I don't really get any freedom from him.
Half a million, Soren. This is what you agreed to. Just grin and bare it.
I don't realize I'm crushing the paper cup in my hand until tepid liquid splashes across my fingers, and subsequently, my desk. It pools across the top of my laptop, and I sigh my frustration because I really don't need to scream and draw everyone's attention. I look around for napkins and spot the plant on Declan's desk instead.
It's petty, surely, to water his plant with the coffee I didn't want. I know it, and I know it's childish too. Neither of those things stops me from grabbing the cup I'd abandoned seconds before and rushing to his desk. The soil is damp, and I wonder whether he has a real assistant who comes in and takes care of things like tidying up his desk and watering this damn thing.
I don't know what coffee does to plants, but I'm going to find out.
The liquid pools at first on the surface of the soil, and then it begins to sink through. It's completely saturated, and a mixture of coffee, water, and soil begins to bleed out of the drainage holes in the bottom.
Oops.
"Plant murderer."
