Page 16 of Colin Gets Promoted and Dooms the World
The little man grasped my hand in his and pumped my arm up and down enthusiastically while I remained seated behind my desk. “Lovely to meet you. Barney Samuels.”
“Uh, hello, sir. Good to meet you.”
Mr.Samuels turned back to Ms.Crenshaw. “I’ve had some news, Margaret. Those poor souls who disappeared from the elevator on Monday? It’s clear now that the building suffered an incursion.”
Struggling to keep my expression blank, I pretended to type something as I listened.
Ms.Crenshaw’s voice was coolly skeptical. “Something got through our defenses?”
“So it seems. Something powerful.”
“Do we know what it was?”
“I’ve asked Analysis and Logistics to take a look. Tomas is putting his best people on it.”
“Very well. Thank you for letting me know, Barney.”
“Of course, Margaret, of course!” Turning away, he then paused and swiveled back to look at me. “By the way, I don’t suppose you could spare Mr.Harris here for an hour or so this afternoon? It’s Blood Sacrifice Thursday and I can’t find Deborah anywhere.”
Blood Sacrifice Thursdays were kind of a big deal around the office. This was when Dark Enterprises paid its dues to the ancient gods that slumbered behind the world, thus ensuring our survival for another week. Plus, the cafeteria served grilled cheese sandwiches, the greatest of all lunch options.
“Oh dear,” Ms.Crenshaw murmured. “Where do you suppose Deborah might be?”
He waved a hand carelessly. “Oh, I sent her to the Repository yesterday to fetch the Cursed Periapt of Anhk-Magon.”
“Perhaps she was flung into the Abyss. The Periapt can be finicky.”
“Yes, perhaps. Terribly inconvenient if that’s the case.”
I added “being flung into the Abyss” to my mental list of occupational hazards, which was now terrifyingly long.
“Colin will assist you this afternoon, then,” Ms.Crenshaw told him with a glance at me. “He should see how we perform sacrifices here.”
Mr.Samuels’s lips curved into a delighted smile beneath his mustache as he leaned over my desk and gave me a nudge in the shoulder. “Maybe you’ll be wielding the knife someday, eh?”
“That would be wonderful,” I told him with an enthusiastic nod.
“Well then, splendid,” he said. “We’re starting at noon in theLower Sanctum. See you then, dear boy. Goodbye, Margaret!” Then he bounded out of the waiting room with a last cheerful wave.
“He seems nice,” I noted cautiously.
Ms.Crenshaw’s lips quirked. “Don’t let the avuncular act fool you. Barney Samuels was a founding partner here in our New York office. He’s done things that would give you nightmares for the rest of your life.”
“Huh.” I paused before asking, “Howdoessomeone become a founding partner in a company like this?”
“Ambition,” she responded crisply.
“You mean, like…a desire for world domination?”
“Oh, we have our share of megalomaniacs”—she shook her head as if to sayDon’t even get me started on those guys—“but most of us here at Dark Enterprises just want to make a difference.”
I nodded as if every multinational corporation had its megalomaniacs. I mean, they probably did. “But someone like Mr.Samuels,” I persisted. “He wanted to make a difference so hard that he…became a founding partner?”
Ms.Crenshaw looked at me in silence.
“Just curious,” I mumbled.
“Curiosity can be a virtue,” she finally remarked, “so long as it doesn’t lead you too far astray.” Her gaze flicked to the doorway through which Mr.Samuels had departed. “Barney came to New York a very long time ago. It was a different city then. Fewer opportunities than today, but brimming with new wealth and people desperate to get their hands on more. Barney insinuated himself into the city’s highest circles and made a series of deals that put much of the Four Hundred in his debt. Management noticed, and when They decided to establish an office in New York, They appointed Barney as a founding partner.”
