Charlie
There’s a bustle around the office that isn’t normal.
It’s Monday morning. Everyone should look depressed and tired. No one should be perky. They definitely shouldn’t be exchanging niceties with each other like they are in this parallel universe.
Jackie sits on reception with a full head of smokey evening make-up, dressed like she’s about to walk down the runway.
We must have a really rich client visiting the office. She’s too distracted to even take a swipe at me as I walk past.
I walk onto the fourth-floor open-plan office.
This is so wrong. People should be eating breakfast, scrolling through social media and talking loudly about the weekend. Anything but actual work. This morning, there’s not a single social media page being browsed.
I walk past each desk, and it’s the same body snatcher scene. My colleagues have been replaced with polite clones executing work activities and whispering in hushed tones.
Terrifying.
On my way to my desk, I pass Mike. He has what looks to be all the reports from this quarter scattered across the floor. He’s never read those reports before despite us sending them religiously. How did he even find a copy by himself?
“Stevie!” I grab Stevie’s arm. “What the hell’s going on?”
He looks at me like I’m a moron. “The buyout’s done. Today the new diggers come in, i.e., the new CEO and his management. Get ready for the bulldoze.”
“Oh.” Last week, I hadn’t paid attention to the updates. So that’s who the new suits milling around are. “But they’ve said not much will change, we’ll just have a parent company. Mike called them a friendly passive owner. They’ll just leave us alone, right? Why does everyone look so uptight?”
Stevie rolls his eyes. “They always say that. Nexus have bought us. They don’t just leave companies alone. They buy the company, trim the fat and suck the best bets into Nexus.”
“What?” I stop walking. “Nexus?”
No.
Stevie has it wrong. There’s been a mistake.
The blood drains from my face down my body and accumulates around my ankles. There is no way that Danny Walker would have bought our company.
“Bullshit,” I spit out.
“No bullshit,” Stevie replies. “You’ll see for yourself when they come in. Get your CV together because that CEO guy of Nexus will annihilate half the company. He cherry-picks only the best, and the rest of us will be on our arses down at the job centre.”
Suddenly, there is not enough oxygen in the room.
“It doesn’t make sense. They don’t operate in the insurance sector.” I collapse into my chair, flapping my hands.
“They changed their minds, they do now.” He shrugs, leaning against the side of my desk. “They’ve taken over all the other markets. It was just a matter of time.”
I swallow air and choke. “OK, but surely they’ll leave us alone?”
“Not likely. From what I’ve read, Danny Walker is ruthless. My mate works at ETech. Nexus bought it last year. Fifty percent of the team chopped. The people that kept their jobs now work ten-hour days. It’s hell, he said.”
“Are we the fat?” I squeak. “I’ve only been in my promotion a year.”
He grabs my hand, irritated. “Stop drumming your fingers on the table like that; you look like a basket case.”
“Sorry,” I whimper. “It’s just that this is really bad news.”
“I don’t know why you are so worried.” He points at himself. “I’m fucked. I’ve been doing three hours of work a day since I got here. I can fool Mike, but these guys will sniff out my slacking a mile off.” He frowns. “Wait. Isn’t your brother mates with the main man, Walker?”
“Yes.” I sigh.
“So, you’re fine? He’ll never get rid of his friend’s sister.”
“I’m not fine.” I slump forward in my chair. “For the past eight years, I’ve barely been able to be in the same room as Danny Walker out of shame. He thinks I’m a hopeless desperado who he prefers to ignore, and now, thanks to Saturday night, has fresh in his mind the idea that I’m a useless employee who doesn’t deserve a pay rise and spends her day sleeping in the toilets at work.”
I inhale sharply. “So, no. I’m not fine.”
“OK.” He stares at me. “I didn’t understand any of that. You’re going to have to explain it in more detail.”
Dare I tell Stevie? He knows about every other aspect of my life. He even accompanied me to the pharmacy to pick up thrush medication, for moral support. At least I’d get a bloke’s perspective.
Mike knocks his fist against the pillar in the middle of the room, so I don’t get a chance to elaborate. “Main boardroom in fifteen minutes,” he bellows, shuffling from foot to foot. He looks even twitchier than I do. He must be afraid they’ll ask him what I.T. stands for and find out the truth; he’s got no clue.
“The end is nigh,” Stevie declares ominously.
I attempt to swallow the giant lump in my throat.
“Gotta do emails.” He turns to walk towards his desk but not before pointing his finger at me. “But I’ll be back later to hear this story.”
People are already loitering around the boardroom even though we’ve got a quarter of an hour left. There will be zero productivity until this meeting is done.
I squint to see through the glass.
There he is.
Danny Walker leans against the boardroom podium, talking to some other blokes in suits.
My skin prickles at the sight of him.
The dark blue tailored suit fits perfectly over his athletic figure. Just a little bit of dark chest hair peeks out of the crisp white shirt, and he has a few days’ worth of stubble growth, giving him a rough edge. He looks sensational.
Smug arrogant bastard, swaggering around like he owns the place. Because the motherfucker does now.
I don’t know whether I’m turned on or traumatised. Likely a bit of both.
So this is the CEO version of Danny Walker. I’m used to seeing him in social environments. I’m even more rattled than I usually am when he’s in a room, which I didn’t think was possible.
I feel so stupid. Why the hell didn’t he mention this on Saturday evening?
Am I so insignificant to him that he couldn’t muster the common courtesy of saying, “By the way, Charlie, you know that company where you’ve worked for five years, and haven’t yet been given a raise? Well, guess what, it’s mine now.”
My heart pounds at the thought of entering the boardroom. Maybe I can sneak away, and Stevie can tell me what he said.
No, I’ll need to face Danny Walker sometime. Besides, why do I care what this man thinks of me?
When those intense brown eyes catch my gaze, my breath hitches. I duck down behind my monitor. Very mature. Is this what work will be every day now? Hiding under my monitor?
“Time to face the showdown,” Stevie calls over to me, getting up from his seat.
I nod and fall in line with him as we shuffle into the boardroom with the rest of the team.
I slump into a seat near the door and drag Stevie along with me. I need physical and moral support if I collapse.
Tension circulates through the air like it’s being pumped out the vents. About fifty of us squeeze into a boardroom meant for thirty people max. The Seattle and India offices are on video link.
People line the walls, standing up.
My knees bounce up and down as I rock from side to side in my seat. I’m claustrophobic. I need to leave this room. My fight-or-flight response tries to kick in. But what can I do? I can’t punch him in the face. Equally I can’t run from the room, I’ll cause a scene.
Someone shuts the door.
With his sleeves rolled up, Danny Walker leans against the podium. He looks the opposite of me—relaxed, confident and breathing easy. This is just another day in the office for him, another takeover. He swirls coffee in his hand and laughs easily with another guy.
There’s no question about who owns the room.
He looks up, and his eyes search the group looking for something or someone.
I sink further into my chair. Eye contact in this close proximity will induce a panic attack.
The room is filled with dull chatter as Danny talks to the other guy, not in any hurry to greet us.
Finally, he clears his throat, and the room quietens.
He doesn’t have to shout or bang fists like Mike. Danny Walker is dominant at his core. Cat was right. A man’s man.
Silence descends as everyone awaits his first word. I hear my heartbeat loud in my ears and wonder if anyone else can.
“Hello.” The low guttural voice makes everyone sit up straight. “I’m Danny Walker, founder, and CEO of The Nexus Group.”
Like we needed that introduction.
I hear someone’s ovaries explode.
“By now, you have been told the news of our partnership between Dunley Tech and Nexus.” He smiles around the room, flashing perfect white teeth.
“It’s hardly a partnership,” Stevie mutters under his breath.
“I’m very excited about our new venture together,” Danny continues, slowly pacing across the floor. “At Nexus, we’ve been watching your journey for a while now, and I see a lot of potential in your software.”
I cringe, sinking further into my seat. He’s been watching my company and said nothing. Did he tell Tristan? Did they talk about how I would react? Am I the last to know?
I’ve worked here for five years. I know the weaknesses, and I have ideas on how to improve them. Being on I.T support is like being verbally slapped in the face every day. Everything is your fault, even when it’s not. No one ever calls support to say well done, good job, do they? As the team leader, I take the full verbal beating to the face when a particularly nasty call comes in.
Is my opinion so irrelevant to Danny Walker that he barely thought it was worth a quick: “Hey Charlie, you know the company you’ve worked at for years, what’s it like?”
The deep baritone interrupts my inner rant. “It just needs a little more drive, more innovation to take it to the next level and truly dominate the insurance sector. Nexus is the company to do that.” Every word is spoken with the confidence of a man who has no doubts about his abilities.
With my hand resting on my stomach, I take slow deep breaths.
Beside me, Stevie gives me a funny look.
This is pathetic. Danny Walker’s presence is turning me into a hot mess.
It looks like I’m not the only one. As I glance around the room, I see all the girls in the office staring up at him like they want his babies. They’re all flicking their hair, touching their lips, smiling, re-crossing their legs, and other desperate attempts to bring his focus towards their body parts. In the front row, Jackie leans forward to offer a bird’s eye view of her breasts.
My heart plummets.
I zone out. I can’t listen to his words. Sitting here, one of many, I realise just how much we are worlds apart and how ridiculous I was for trying to dry hump the guy. I’m surprised he didn’t call the police on me.
“I plan to get to know all of you, what you do and what the company stands for,” he continues in his dry Scottish voice. “The company has been operating at a certain level, good but not exemplary. I will personally oversee the smooth transition of Dunley Tech, so you’ll see a lot of me around the office over the next few months.”
What?
No, no, no. I’ll never survive sustained exposure to Danny Walker.
He stops in the middle of the room. “In the meantime, there’s nothing to be worried about, just go about your day job as normal. Later today, the team will send out the information you need to understand any changes over the next few months while you become employees of Nexus.”
Stevie shoots his hand up. What the hell! I’m supposed to be camouflaging myself.
Danny squints to see who has their hand raised. “Yes?” He nods for Stevie to ask his question.
He tilts his head to see me over the shoulder of the guy I’m hiding behind. Our eyes lock for a painful moment before he turns his attention to Stevie.
“How do you see the team size changing when we merge with Nexus?” Stevie asks.
There’s a communal intake of breath around the room.
The million-dollar question.
Are we going to keep our jobs?
“Some of the departments will need restructuring,” Danny replies, straight to the point. He props a foot up on one of the podium steps and rests his elbow on his knee. Even in his suit, he looks more like Special Forces than a tech CEO. “It may mean role changes or even redundancies. I can assure you if that happens, you will be rewarded fairly for your time with Dunley. We’ll start with offering voluntary redundancies.”
The group collectively stiffens.
Some of us will lose our jobs.
Murmurs resound around the room and on the video conference. The remote offices look even more freaked out than us.
“Think heavily about what you want to do,” he continues, unaffected by the tension in the room. “Nexus is a highly rewarding but competitive environment. We recruit only top calibre. If you are not willing to put in one hundred percent, then it is not for you. We’ll also be suspending the lease on this building and moving the company into the main Nexus headquarters. Still London Bridge, so your commute time will remain the same. Although hopefully, you’ll find the new offices a little more,” he pauses, searching for the right word, “interesting.”
That’s an understatement. Dunley Tech office is a funeral parlour compared to the swanky, sexy Nexus headquarters.
Tristan gave me a tour once. It features a rooftop lounge overlooking the River Thames, a gym with a jacuzzi, multiple restaurants and cafes, and a yoga studio. It is designed for staff to never leave the building and never dream of leaving the company. If you make it past their gruelling recruitment process, you’re a lifer.
A babble of excitement flows through the room. If we make the cut, we get to leave our depressing drab office.
“That’s all for now.” He nods, informing us our time is up.
Most of us pile out of the boardroom while some loiter. The loiterers fall into two categories: the Jackies who want airtime to practice their art of seduction, and the arse-lickers who want to stand out to the new boss man.
I’m in my own category, the fool that dry humps the boss without his authorisation.
Mike stands beside the podium, jutting his chest out in an extreme show of peacocking. “Any questions, let me know!” he shouts.
Everyone ignores him.
Danny Walker shifts his gaze to Stevie and me and raises his eyebrows slightly in acknowledgement.
I nod briefly in return and burst out of the doorway, barraging my way through the bottleneck.
“So?” Stevie nudges me when we return to our desks. “Spill the story.”
“Fine.” I slump into my wheely chair. “Eight years ago, I was at a party at Tristan’s. Danny always attends Tristan’s parties, so of course he was there. He never talked to me much at them, I was just the young silly sister at college, and he was the CEO running his big shot company. He was talking stocks, and I was taking shots.”
“And?” Stevie makes a motion for me to hurry up and get to the good bit.
“I was drunk at the party. Back then, that was nothing new. Cat and I brought this rocket fuel spirit to Tristan’s house. Let’s just say it gave me the illusion of grandiosity. I misread Danny Walker’s signals, climbed onto his lap, and began manhandling him. But he rejected me and pushed me away.”
“You what?” Stevie roars. “This is brilliant. You just made my day. You basically indecently assaulted the new CEO.”
“Glad someone is happy about it.” I tut, crossing my arms. “I’ve been so embarrassed that I’ve barely spoken to him since then. It’s a lose-lose situation. Either I stay and hide from him in shame, or I quit and try to start over somewhere else. I can’t face seeing him in this office for the next few months.”
Stevie looks over at Danny, who is still in the boardroom, a strained look on his face as he talks to Mike. Mike throws his arms around excitedly. “It was eight years ago.” Stevie shrugs. “He’s had so many women grab his dick since then, he must have forgotten it.”
I shake my head. “He doesn’t like me. He never talks to me. He just grunts and frowns. He thinks I’m Tristan’s silly little sister,” I continue, logging into my laptop. How the hell can I concentrate on work now?
“Shit.” Stevie looks at his watch and jumps up. “Look, all you did was grab your boss’s boss’s boss’s dick. It could be worse.”
“How could it be worse?” I mutter, putting on my glasses.
“It could have been Mike’s dick.” He waves dismissively and hurries back to his desk.
I breathe out loudly, and absently check our open support tickets. I can’t focus with this hanging over me. I need to take matters into my own hands. In the browser, I type London’s main job page and press return. Let’s see what this city has to offer.
Someone clears their throat behind me.
Tilting my head around, I stare into his masculine, sharp face. He stands too close, towering above me. So close, I can smell his scent.
“Charlie.” He fixes his detached stare on me.
“Mr. Walker,” I reply, my throat dry.
Annoyance flickers over his face. “There’s no need to call me that here. I’m still Danny.”
“Why didn’t you tell me on Saturday?” I ask, my voice faltering. “You knew that I work here.”
“Yes, I knew that.” His lips disappear in a tight line. “I couldn’t announce it before today. Legalities.”
I smell bullshit.
With a dark stare, he looks over my shoulder and then back at me. “Looks like you’re busy.”
Shit.
The job site.
I bite down on my lip. “Just in case you no longer need an I.T. Support lead.” I swallow the hard lump in my throat, feeling my cheeks burning.
He hesitates but doesn’t correct me. He’s about to speak when a blonde lady approaches, beckoning him to follow her. Cheryl, I think her name is. “If you’ll excuse me, Charlie.”
“Oh,” Stevie calls out while Danny Walker is still in earshot. “You could cut the tension with a knife.”
Danny hears it because he cocks his head slightly at Stevie before walking on.
“Behave,” I snap back.
***
It’s Monday evening, and we’ve moved our Thursday flat dinner date forward. It was called for after my nasty little surprise today.
The girls are talking about the mice situation in the flat while I’m typing away on my work phone.
Julie watches me. “What drama is it this time? Someone’s lost a cable?”
I glare at her. “It’s the Seattle office. They’ve lost connectivity to the London server that hosts the invoicing application.”
She rolls her eyes. “Please stop talking. I’m bored.”
Cat pats my hand. “You have to tune out, Charl. It can wait until tomorrow. There will always be some problem you need to solve.” She smiles sympathetically. “You just need to try to relax and not think about it outside of work hours.”
I give her a strained smile. “It’s out of work hours in London. But in Seattle, it’s morning time. Then in another few hours, Singapore will be waking up, then India.”
“You can’t be on call all the time,” says Cat.
“Besides.” I sigh, taking a sip of wine. “Danny Walker already has it in his head that I’m useless at my job. I don’t want to give him an excuse.”
My phone beeps as messages come in thick and fast.
I type my response to the Seattle Support team and hit Send.
“Jeez.” Julie’s eyes widen. “You’re a freak. You can actually type without looking at the screen.”
I smirk. “Don’t you have to type in work, Julie? Or do you just bully your paralegals into doing everything?”
“Of course,” she replies deadpan. “I talk. They type.”
“Why do you have so many issues, Charlie?” Cat asks.
“Mike thinks we have a big lever for the company that we pull up and down to get online.” I use air quotation marks for emphasis. “He won’t let me move us to the cloud.”
Cat nods, her eyes glazing over slightly. “The cloud.”
I’ve drawn Cat the same diagrams as I’ve drawn Mike. Even her knowledge surpasses his now. She nods sympathetically, and I decide it’s time to change the subject.
Sometimes I wish my friends understood the pressure on me. While Cat and Julie meet for Legs, Bums and Tums twice a week, I’m busy working round the clock trying to support dodgy systems. Any time of day, I can tell you what time it is in any time zone. Cat has a running joke about my ‘clock watching.’ All applications have to be running and available twenty-four hours a day.
“Why are you bothering?” Julie questions. “It sounds like you’ll be out the door soon if Danny Walker despises you so badly.”
“Maybe it’s time to move on, Charlie?” Cat asks.
She’s right. Why am I bothering?
My belly lets out a rumble, and Julie looks at me in disgust. “Control yourself, woman, will you?”
“I haven’t eaten lunch today,” I complain. “Where’s Suze?”
Suze was supposed to meet us thirty minutes ago, and the waitress is getting twitchy since we only have the table for another forty-five. If we have to go somewhere else for food, I’m going to throttle her. This is very unlike her to be late for a dinner date.
“She must have fallen under a bus.” Julie looks at her watch in disbelief. “Unbelievable.”
“Hey, girls,” Suze rushes over to the table, flustered, flapping leaflets in her hands. “Guess where I have been?”
We wait.
“Here!” She lays the leaflets with a zen like model bending backward on a mat down in front of us.
“Bikram Yoga,” Cat reads aloud. “That’s the yoga you do in thirty degrees?”
“Forty, actually,” Suze corrects. “It’s amazing! The difference it can make, honestly, girls, this is it for me.”
“Have you just come from it?” I ask.
We look at her in surprise. Suze has signed up for more fitness schemes than I can remember, but she rarely manages to start them, never mind follow through the course.
“Uh-huh.” She nods. “I bought a twenty-day introductory pass. I thought I’d be cautious. I didn’t want to purchase the yearly pass just yet, but I reckon I’ll be going at least three times a week.”
“Let’s not get too carried away,” I jump in. We’ve been here before when Suze tried to get a refund for her zen-do kickboxing outfit. “So … did you like this yoga?”
Suze laughs. “Oh, tonight was just an introductory chat and filling out the registration form. I didn’t actually take the class!” She shrugs dismissively. “I know it’s the sport for me. I’ve tried yoga before, and I liked it. Only thing I didn’t like was all the stretching and lunging. But in forty degree heat, you can bend more easily.”
“But you look really …” Cat tries to search for a word nicer than sweaty, “flushed?”
Suze nods enthusiastically. “Even the reception was boiling! I probably lost weight just sitting in the reception area.”
“Forty degrees is pretty hot.” I frown. ‘Suze, I don’t think this class is meant to be relaxing. If just sitting in reception made you sweat, God knows what it’s like in the actual yoga studio.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever stood in forty-degree heat, never mind exercised in it,” Cat muses.
“Well, now is your chance,” Suze replies happily. “Because I have signed you both up with me,” she says, facing Cat and I fully now.
My mouth drops. “No, no, no, we are not doing this again.”
I shake my head firmly, ready for a fight.
She pouts. “What about our ‘try everything once’ pact?”
“It sounds like my idea of a nightmare. That’s the last place I want to be. I already pay to stand and sweat on the tube. I don’t need to pay anymore. And I’m too busy with work,” I add quickly as my get-out clause.
“I already have a gym membership, Suze,” Cat points out. “And it’s hard enough to use that. At the rate I attend, I’m paying about twenty pounds a class.”
“Ah, come on, girls,” she whines. “Everyone is talking about it! It’s amazing. It gets rid of all your cellulite.”
“Really?” I snort. “NASA would have a better chance of filling the craters on the moon with Poligrip.” I can’t even look at a goat’s cheese tart without the cheese shooting straight through my system and landing on my butt.
“Actually, Charlie.” Cat looks at me thoughtfully. “She does have a point. Jenny in the Maths department has better legs now than our gym teacher. She has been preaching about Bikram Yoga for months now. And a few other people I know have been raving about it.” Her brows lift. “Don’t you want to look your best with Danny Walker roaming around the office?”
“I suppose, since I’ve lost all dignity, I should try to look half decent,” I reply, through gritted teeth.
“Come on,” Suze whines. “It’s in London Bridge. It’s literally around the corner from your office! Please, please, please.”
“Fine,” I snap, knowing it’s easier to give in and go to the one and only class Suze will ever attend. “I’ll do one class.”
“Yeah!” Suze claps her hands. “Now, let’s celebrate.”
I call over the waitress.
“Caesar salad, please,” Julie shuts her menu, uninterested. She would have been as excited ordering sawdust. If it doesn’t contain nicotine, she’ll take it or leave it.
The waitress looks at Suze, who hasn’t opened her menu.
“I’ll have the steak burger with blue cheese and onion rings as extra, with the mayonnaise and chilli dip and a portion of mini wedges with guacamole.”
“Jesus.” Julie’s face distorts in disgust. “Do you know that off by heart?”
“I have a good memory,” she snaps defensively. “And I’m allowed a treat every now and then. It’s going to evaporate off me at Bikram!”
My phone buzzes again, demanding attention.
“I’m going to smash that bloody thing,” Julie grumbles, and the others don’t argue with her.
I look down.
Charlie
Meet me in my office. 8am
Danny Walker
Shit.
