Worst Week Ever (A Long Road to Love) (30 page)

Carrie noticed
the spectacularly well-dressed woman the moment they climbed out of the taxi.
She stood out like a diamond among coal. Her blond hair, cut to the current
short fashion, emphasized her high cheekbones and long neck. The tailored suit showcased
her slender hourglass figure. The silk blouse beneath the jacket provided
sufficient cleavage to attract, but not so much to detract from the pure
professionalism the high quality suit boldly declared. Her makeup appeared
understated but, unless her skin had actually turned into porcelain cream then
something had to cover the blemishes and tiny potholes normal people possessed.

The moment
Trent and the woman locked eyes, like two of a superior species, they
recognized each other. Her already perfect posture seemed to grow yet
straighter and she tilted her head in an elegant fashion, reminding Carrie of
Katharine Hepburn.

To her dismay,
her boss’s broad shoulders squared up and he grew two inches.
Great, maybe
they’ll circle each other and sniff butts next.

“Coco,” he
said in a voice she’d never heard him use before. It sounded almost British
with upper-crust rounded vowels.

The woman
smiled in return and her teeth couldn’t have been whiter if someone had colored
them with whiteout. “Trent. So good to see you.”

They kissed
each other on the cheeks, not once but twice.

“You look
fabulous.” He cupped her elbow with his hand.

Her soft laugh
sounded like chimes in the wind. “And you, handsome as ever.” She eyed the
peach-colored tape on his nose. “Did you have work done?”

Trent stared
at her in confusion until she tapped her nose.

A short bark
of embarrassed laughter erupted from him. “No. I broke it while saving an
employee’s life.”

His response
infuriated Carrie on several accounts. First, he broke it running into a glass
door his horrid employees had sabotaged. Second, the employee, he claimed to
have sacrificed his nose for stood right here. He could at least name and
introduce her!

She tried to
control her rage with a lecture.
You aren’t angry with Trent. You’re upset
because a female of his species struts before him like an Arabian pony, which
exposes the stupidity of your dreams. You and Trent will never become partners
in life, neither professionally, nor personally
.

Her lecture to
herself only made her angrier. Carrie stormed to the door intending to unlock
it, only she didn’t have her purse or keys.

I am never
fainting again. Never! Men cannot be trusted to bring along a woman’s basic
necessities.

She returned
her focus to the mating ritual of the rich and beautiful.

Trent moved
closer to the woman. “I’m surprised to see you standing out here. I didn’t
think you’d walk beyond Madison Avenue.”

The woman
glanced at the people about her with disgust, her gaze stopping on Carrie.
“Well, if you wish to relocate to Park Avenue, I will applaud your decision.
Otherwise, I go where I’m needed.”

Trent frowned.
“Pardon?”

She did the
fake chime laugh again and settled her hand on his arm. “Dan Marshal asked me
to help you out.”

“Help how?”

Carrie wanted
to know the same thing.
Oh God, don’t let this be the HR person.

“Surely you
remember my expertise is in human resources.”

“Yes, of
course,” he stated in a weak voice, meaning he hadn’t remembered any such
thing.

“Well,
normally I wouldn’t have considered a job this small and at such a location,
but Dan insisted no one but I could save this hopeless employer. He then showed
me the video of your employees rioting yesterday, and I understood why you needed
me. But honestly, I still refused to take the job until he told me the hopeless
employer’s name.”

“He’s not
hopeless,” Carrie muttered beneath her breath.

The woman
glanced her way then leaned into Trent. “Shall we go inside? The natives seem a
bit restless.”

Trent smiled
at her as if in some sort of trance, unable to answer until she touched him.

“Yes, of
course.” He took her arm and led her to the glass door, which remained closed,
even though he stood before it.

“Damn it,
Carrie. I thought you had the door fixed.”

The woman, now
realizing the restless native worked for Trent, stared at her with a new level
of disgust as she catalogued Carrie’s oily hair, baggy sweats, and tennis
shoes.

Carrie didn’t
know which pissed her off more: the woman’s visual assessment of her value
based on her unprofessional appearance, or Trent cursing at her, which made her
sound like one of his incompetent employees. Rallying her spirit, she smiled up
at her boss. Or at least showed her teeth. Given the rage inside her, she
doubted it came off as a smile.

“The door
is
fixed. All you have to do is locate the key on your key chain, place it in the
lock, and turn it to the left.”

“Where’s your
key?”

“In your
penthouse, in my purse.” She glared at Coco the Perfect
. Make what you want
out of that, bitch.

The woman’s
brow rose and her eyes rounded in amusement. She glanced at Trent as if he’d
lost his mind.

“Carrie’s my
EA. She worked out of my house yesterday,” Trent explained.

The woman
relaxed and returned her focus to Carrie. “From where did you get your graduate
degree?”

With a jut of
her chin, Carrie glared at Trent, ignoring the woman entirely. “I really don’t
wish to re-interview for my job on the street. Will you please reach into your
pocket and retrieve your keys. I’ll take over from there.”

The moment he
pulled the keys from his pocket, she snatched them out of his hand, found the correct
key, and unlocked the door. She tossed the assortment of metal back to him, only
his gaze remained on Coco, so they hit him in the chest and fell to the
sidewalk with a clank. Both of the superior creatures turned and stared at her
in shock.

“Not
intentional,” she muttered as she stormed to the elevator, punched it, and
stared at the light, willing it to hurry.

“I see why I’m
needed,” Coco whispered.

“Carrie’s not
my problem. In fact, she’s the best employee I’ve got.”

“Oh, Trent,
you should have called me before it got this bad.”

“I seem to
recall you telling me never to speak to you again or you’d claw my eyes out,”
Trent replied, not bothering to whisper.

Didn’t matter,
Carrie could hear them either way. Just because she had her back to them didn’t
mean her ears had stopped working.

The fake chime
laugh burst out again.
God, fingernails on a chalkboard would be less
grating!

“That was
years ago, and personal. This is now and business. Besides, I’m sure we’ve both
improved since then.”

“I think I
have,” Trent stated. “I have a lot more patience since Carrie came to work for
me.”

“Yes, well, I
imagine so.”

Carrie abandoned
the elevator and headed to the stairs.

“Where are you
going?” Trent demanded.

“I need
exercise,” she snapped and entered the stairwell.

She so
didn’t
need exercise. She managed to make it to the second floor before she had to sit
down, weak, winded, and weepy.

Her life
sucked! She’d expected today to be the first of better days. Together, she and
Trent would rebuild his staff into a happy, team-working, high performance group.
Unfortunately, this Coco creature had come, and Carrie knew the social
butterfly would focus exclusively on making the middle-class girl’s life pure
hell.

Nor could
Carrie stop her. This horrid woman of Trent's own species had besotted him.

She didn’t
care. Let them rut like bunnies. Didn’t matter to her. She still remained the
best EA he'd ever have.

Dressed in
sweats and tennis shoes, with oily hair.

Glancing at
her watch, a new possibility arose. Actual business hours hadn’t begun yet.
Maybe she should break into the penthouse and take a real shower, dress, and
return looking professional so she could go head-to-head with the bitch.

Great idea,
except for one small issue: she couldn’t break into the penthouse. She’d need a
key.

If only she
hadn’t returned Trent’s keys to him. Now she’d have to go upstairs, somehow
trick him into giving her his keys again then leave without him noticing.

Normally,
going anywhere without Trent would require Tall and Tiny’s magical assistance,
but Mistress Coco had turned Carrie invisible.

Concluding
walking up three more flights beyond her, she walked
down
two flights
and took the elevator up.

When the
elevator doors opened onto the fifth floor, Trent and Coco stood in the lobby
as if afraid to go further.

Trent turned
and threw his hands up at her. “I thought you fixed the office up last night?
This place is a shambles.”

She didn’t
even bother to get out of the elevator. She couldn’t do this. She’d go to Penn
Station and beg for money to get home.

“Carrie?”
Trent voice softened. “Are you okay?”

With a shake
of her head, she pinched the bridge of her nose, refusing to cry in front of the
bitch.

Trent stepped
into the elevator with her, and Coco followed. “I’m sorry I yelled. I’m sure
you did the best you could. We should have called in professionals.”

“Tall, Juan,
and Jose helped me turn over the desks and put the drawers back in,” she stated
softly. “Tiny and Mr. Bergman picked up ledgers and papers. But we didn’t know
what desks they belonged to, so we placed them in piles so the employees could
sort through them today.”

He shook his
head as if he didn’t understand her. “I have boards instead of windows, no
chair, and no telephone. How am I supposed to work?”

If she pinched
her nose any harder, she might permanently crush the cartilage. Trying to stave
off unintended facial reconstruction, she released her nose, breathed in
deeply, and stayed focused on Trent.

“When I said I
got the office good enough for the employees to return, I just meant them. Your
office requires a total makeover. Mr. Bergman placed wood over the broken out
windows so the pigeons won’t enter and nest, but we’ll need to hire…” She
sighed with exhaustion. “Honestly, I don’t know who we need to hire.”

“Don’t worry,”
he said, patting her back. “Coco is in charge of hiring. She’ll figure it out.
Right now, I need you to call whoever your friend is in the police department
and get him to untape my penthouse like he did the office.”

Carrie nodded
just to get him to leave her alone. The man in charge of bomb threats had no
interest in Trent’s apartment. Fortunately, she knew who might have authority
to remove the tape.

When they
exited the building, the two long-legged, beautiful people outpaced her
small-striding, dejected, demoralized self. Soon they disappeared down the
crowded street and finally Carrie could breathe.

She called
Detective Pascal.

“Joseph Pascal.”
He sounded so happy and full of good spirits. Maybe she should become a
policewoman. She wanted to be happy again.

“Detective
Pascal, this is Carrie Hanson.” Her voice quivered. She would not burst into
tears, she would not!

“Carrie,
what’s wrong?”

“I’m having a
really bad day. Would it be possible for Trent to get back into his penthouse?
He rather flipped out at the condition of our office. He wants to work from his
home until we can get professionals to fix up the fifth floor.”

“Can’t he work
from his other house? I understand the place has about a billion rooms. Surely
one of them would work as an office.”

“You’re no
doubt right.” She then shared her wretched morning with him. Too exhausted to
go on she sat on a stoop and buried her head between her knees. “I’m so tired
of having horrible days. I used to be a happy person. Do you believe in curses?
Because I think someone’s cursed me—besides Trent, who damns me every thirty
seconds.”

“Where are
you?”

“I don’t know.
Somewhere between the office and the penthouse.”

“Could you be
more precise?”

She looked
behind her at the door. “Cole’s Liquors. If I had any money, I’d buy out their
inventory. Oh. They’d have to open first. Doesn’t matter, my credit cards are
maxed.”

A man in a
business suit threw some change at her feet as he walked by.

“People are
giving me money, which should tell you how horrible I look. No wonder Trent
treated me like a case of herpes.”

“I’m sending
someone over. Just stay there.”

“Okay.” She
put away her cell phone and stacked the four quarters when some more hopped
about the concrete. “Thank you,” she yelled out. She always appreciated a
response when she gave homeless people money.

She’d earned
four dollars and eighteen cents for being truly pathetic when a scary looking
black guy in his twenties kneeled down before her and laid a firm hand on her
knee.

“Sugar, you
can do better than this. I’ll get you cleaned up and show you how to make good
money.”

“No, thank
you.” She focused on her quarters, praying for him to go away.

“You think
you’ll survive making dimes and nickels. You can’t even buy a cup of coffee
with this shit.” He snatched up her stack of quarters and threw them across the
sidewalk. “I could lift you up and carry you off with one hand. Or you can come
willingly. Choice is yours. You want a good boss or a bad one?”

Her heart
quadrupled its beat, her throat constricted, and her body literally trembled in
fear. God, she truly was cursed.

Whatever I
did, God, I’m sorry and if you’ll only tell me how I pissed you off, I will
never do it again.