I’m halfway through my second cup of Monday morning coffee when the email arrives.
The subject line alone makes me choke.
MEETING REQUEST FROM VINCENT AKOPOV
Coffee splatters across my keyboard. “No, no, no,” I whisper hoarsely, dabbing at the keys with my sleeve.
I consider fleeing the country. How hard could it be to get a fake passport, dye my hair, pick up an Aussie accent? I could probably open a surf shop, right? Work retail? Work a pole, if all else fails?
Any of that would be preferable to facing down the Akopov firing squad.
Because that’s what this has to be about, right? I’m about to get fired, canned, sacked. Maybe drawn and quartered, too, if the rumors about Mr. Akopov’s family’s secret activities are even remotely true.
It’s not just that I saw him having sex with someone he probably shouldn’t have been having sex with.
It’s that, for a moment, I punctured the veil. I witnessed something I shouldn’t have dared to see.
I saw the man half-naked, for God’s sake.
But what good would running do? Because if he is truly as “connected” as the rumor mill says, then wouldn’t he just find me?
And if he did… if I tried to flee and he hunted me down…
How much worse would the punishment be then?
It’s hard to be too breathless about it all—but that’s only because I spent all of last night imagining all the what-ifs that I swore I wouldn’t think about.
What if I stayed in that doorway?
What if I stepped inside?
What if I threw Vanessa out and locked the door and turned to him and said, I’ve been waiting for this?
Those what-ifs ended the exact same way that all my what-ifs have ended for the last five years: with me, alone in my crummy apartment, sweaty and shivering and shamelessly soaked all at once, bedsheets tangled around my bare legs.
But last night’s what-if was the most earth-shattering one yet. I’m still drooling just thinking about it. I practically blacked out and came to, foaming at the mouth like a rabid sex monster.
Now, it’s time to reap what I’ve sown.
Was it my fault? No.
But do I have to deal with it? Just like all the messes in my life that are not of my own making…
Yes. Yes, I do.
So I click the email with trembling fingers.
Ms. St. Clair,
Mr. Akopov requests your presence in his office tomorrow at 9:00 AM sharp to discuss an urgent matter.
Please confirm receipt of this message. Punctuality is highly advised.
Regards,
Diane Montrose
Executive Assistant to Vincent Akopov
My stomach drops to somewhere south of my ankles.
This is it. I’m getting fired. Suddenly, it’s not sexy or darkly funny anymore. It’s just terrifying.
Because if I get fired…
What will happen to Mom?
“Mr. Peterson?” I call out to my supervisor, trying to keep my voice steady. “I’m feeling a bit sick. Mind if I work from home today?”
My supervisor, Kevin, barely glances up from his monitor. “Whatever. Just get the Harrison drafts to me by three.”
I grab my laptop and practically run for the elevator.
Twenty minutes later, I’m pacing my tiny apartment, phone pressed to my ear. “Pick up, pick up, pick up,” I chant. “Please, for the love of—”
“Marketing, Natalie speaking.”
“Nat, it’s me.” I’m whispering, even though I’m alone in my apartment. “I’m so screwed.”
“Row? Why are you whispering? And why aren’t you at your desk?”
I collapse onto my couch. “He summoned me.”
“Who summoned you?”
“Who do you think? Is there anyone else in our company who summons people?”
There’s a pause. “Wait, like… Do you mean…?”
“Yes, dammit!” I wail. “Vincent! I have to meet with him tomorrow at nine.”
“Holy shit,” Natalie breathes. “What for?”
I’m suddenly incredibly shy. “The details aren’t important.”
“Counterpoint: The details are extremelyfuckingimportant. The details are the whole thing! The details are all that matter! Rowan, if you don’t tell me what happened—because something definitely happened; I can hear it in your voice and I’ve got a sixth sense for hot, juicy goss, which this definitely qualifies as—then I swear on God and Jesus and Joseph and Mary and Timothée fucking Chalamet that I will start to scream in three, two—”
“Okay! Okay! Please just stop.” I press my face into a pillow. “I may have walked in on Mr. Akopov, you know… doing things.”
“What kind of things?”
“SEX things, Nat! With his secretary! On his desk!”
The silence on the other end of the line lasts so long I think we’ve been disconnected. I hold the phone away from my ear to check, but nope, the call is still active.
“… Natalie?”
A strangled sound comes through the phone, followed by the most uproarious, full-blown cackling I’ve ever heard. It’s like a hyena on laughing gas. Straight-up depraved.
“It’s not funny!” I protest. “He saw me! And he… he…”
“He what?” Natalie is wheezing like a pug walking up the Empire State Building now. “He farted mid-thrust? He asked you to peg him at the same time?”
“He winked.”
The laughter stops abruptly.
The pause that comes after is not nearly as funny as the ones that preceded it. “Holy shit, Rowan. When did this happen?”
“Friday night. When you made me deliver those reports.”
“Oh my God,” Natalie says. “And he’s just now calling you in?! What happened to Saturday and Sunday? Was he, like, planning your termination all weekend? Twisting his evil billionaire mustache and wondering how to make it as painful as possible? And what were you doing all weekend? Why’d you wait so long to loop me in? Do you hate me?!”
The truth is that Mom wasn’t doing so good when I got home after that disastrous encounter. One of her “little hiccups,” as she calls them, which means she fainted and fell while trying to get out of bed and sprained her wrist. We spent the weekend in the hospital.
It was almost nice, in a sick kind of way.
Because, for just a little while, I could focus on her and her alone.
Now, though… Now, everything is about me again.
And none of it is good.
“Thanks for that mental image, Nat,” I mutter. “Super reassuring.”
“Sorry, sorry. But Row, this is serious. Did you report it to HR?”
I sit bolt upright. “Report what? Me barging into his private office without knocking?”
“No, him sexually harassing you with his bare ass!”
I twist a strand of hair around my finger. “I don’t think it counts as harassment.”
“He literally winked at you while he was having sex with someone else!”
“Maybe I misunderstood.” My face burns at the memory. “Maybe he meant, like, Be with you in a second!”
“That’s not even one percent better.”
I groan and flop backwards. “What am I going to do, Nat? I can’t lose this job. Mom’s medical bills—”
“I know. Honey, I know.” Her voice softens into the caring tone of my best friend, my ride-or-die. “Look, maybe it’s not as bad as you think. What if he just wants to, like, apologize?”
I laugh bitterly. “Men like him don’t apologize to women like me.”
I can practically hear her Feminist Queen frown powering up. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You know exactly what it means.” I stare at the water stain on my ceiling, which promptly assumes the shape of the bare ass we’re discussing. That familiar flare of longing perks up somewhere low in my abdomen. “He’s rich, gorgeous, and could literally have anyone. I’m… me.”
“And what’s wrong with you, huh?” Natalie demands.
I wave my hand at my empty apartment, as if she can see it. “Look at my life, Nat. I’m twenty-seven and I live in a shoebox. I haven’t had a date in two years. My idea of luxury is splurging on name-brand cereal.”
“So what? You’re smart, talented, and way too good for that marketing associate position.”
“Tell that to my bank account.”
“Rowan Elizabeth St. Clair,” Natalie scolds sternly, “this pity party ends now. You go to that meeting tomorrow with your head held high. Whatever happens, you face it with dignity.”
“Even if I get fired?”
“Even if you get fired—which you won’t.”
I take a deep breath. “You’re right. Dignity. I can do dignity.”
“That’s my girl,” she says with satisfaction. Then her voice drops into a guilty register. “Now, tell me exactly what he looked like.”
“Natalie!”
“What? I’m just trying to get all the facts.”
Despite everything, I laugh. “All I saw was muscles. Lots and lots of muscles.”
“Hm. Disappointing. No glimpse of the Akopov family jewels?”
“I’m hanging up now.”
“Wait! Pause. Slow your roll. What are you wearing for the meeting tomorrow?”
I glance at my open closet. “I don’t know. The navy pantsuit?”
“Absolutely not. That thing makes you look like Hillary Clinton at a funeral.”
“I might be. My career’s funeral.”
“Row, be serious,” says Natalie. “This might be your one chance to make a real impression.”
I roll my eyes. “Fine. What do you suggest? My nonexistent designer wardrobe?”
Her answer comes way too quickly for my liking. “Wear that green dress. The one from the Christmas party.”
“Absolutely not!” My stomach cartwheels around in my ribcage. “That’s, like, a hundred times too sexy for a work meeting that might end with my head rolling around on his office floor.”
“I’m not even gonna make the obvious joke about all the other reasons you might end up rolling around on his office floor…”
“—thank you for your admirable restraint—”
“… because,” she continues, “it’s flattering, it’s professional enough, and it makes your eyes pop.”
I bite my lip and let out a defeated sigh. “You think so?” I ask, knowing even as I say it that I’m fishing for a compliment. Sue me—God knows I need a little bit of a pick-me-up right now to keep me out of my doomish-and-gloomish ways.
“I know so. Green dress, nude heels, hair down. Trust me. You do trust me, right?”
I sigh one more time. There’s only one possible reply, so I give it to her. “With my life, Natty. With my life.”
“Good. I love you, Row-Row. Everything’s gonna be fine.”
After we hang up, I pull out the dress Natalie mentioned. It’s the most expensive thing I own—a rare indulgence from last year’s bonus that I’ve worn exactly once.
It’s off the rack, but it might as well be tailored for how well it fits. Molded perfectly to my body, hitting just above the knee. The color is a deep emerald that does in fact bring out my eyes.
Too bold, probably.
But what do I have to lose?
I hang it on my closet door and spend the rest of the day alternating between working on the Harrison drafts and imagining increasingly catastrophic scenarios for tomorrow’s meeting.
By midnight, I’ve convinced myself I’m not only getting fired but possibly arrested for corporate espionage and/or being a creepy Peeping Tom.
When I do finally go to bed, I toss and turn all night, plagued by dreams where I’m running naked through the office while Vincent chases me with a stack of quarterly reports in one hand and Vanessa’s panties in the other.
At 3 A.M., I give up on sleep entirely and clean my entire apartment.
At 5 A.M., I take the world’s longest shower.
At 6 A.M., I try on the green dress, take it off, put on the navy pantsuit, take that off, and finally resign myself to the green dress.
At 7 A.M., I’m on my third cup of coffee, jittery and nauseous.
At 8 A.M., I leave my apartment, looking better than I have in months and feeling worse than I have in years.
One way or another, at 9 A.M., my life is going to change forever.
I just wish I knew if that was a good thing…
… or a very, very bad one.
