Unsuitable

“I can see you’re angry.”

“And I can see your dealing with difficult people skills showing.”

Chris’ chin jerked up. Oh, she’d gone too far. Pricked his conscience. Or maybe not far enough, because his heart seemed to be doing just fine while hers was running a marathon and treating it like a sprint.

“Did you expect me not to be angry? I’m currently holding the fort for Jonathan as well as doing my own job. Last week I had to brief a director on how to approach a public private partnership. He’s paid more than me. Not just incrementally, significantly more, and he’s eligible for a bonus and I’m not. And you think I should take all that calmly. I had no option but to take it calmly when I came back from leave, and then when it’s presented as a failure on my part to have the right skills, all I can do is work harder. But you just admitted it wasn’t about that.”

“No, Audrey, I didn’t and getting upset isn’t going to help.”

If voodoo dolls had toenails, under them, is where she’d stick pins. “If a woman gets upset, she’s hysterical and irrational. If a man gets upset, he’s justifiably angry. Why is it okay to slam doors and shout at assistants, but not to cr

y? And woe betide a woman who slams doors—what a bitch. I’ve never understood why women are supposed to be likeable, but a man can be a right bastard.” She took a breath. Chris was stony faced. “Don’t worry, I won’t break any furniture or burst into inconvenient tears. I won’t abuse my assistant or throw my phone against a wall.”

Chris moved to the door and opened it. He was over this, signalling his intention to leave the conversation and suggesting strongly she shut up.

“But don’t expect me not to be angry, and if I don’t get promoted this round, I’ll take you up on your offer. I’ll come and tell you how unhappy I am.”

He gave one sharp nod and gestured to the open doorway, allowing her the courtesy to leave the room before him, too smart to run from the fight. “I’d expect nothing less.”

She swept past him on a witch’s broom of incantations and barely contained rage, and uttered the words he didn’t expect, “Right before I quit.”

“I beg your pardon.”

She flashed him a quick smile, an all is forgiven, an everything is back to normal programming look. “I said, otherwise I’d be a silly nit.”

They both knew that’s not what she said. But she didn’t give him time to call her on it. She left him holding the door and went down the empty corridor to the lift well. Once out of sight she leant against the wall because her knees had turned into hunks of soft, squishy caramel. She’d more or less threatened the company COO with her resignation if she didn’t get a promotion. That would be why it was difficult to breathe and she felt like throwing up.

She had a huge mortgage, most of her salary went on it and Mia’s care. She not only loved her job; despite the issue of seniority, she needed it, and other companies in the industry had an even worse record for employing women in leadership roles.

If she was lucky, she wouldn’t run into Chris for another month and by then something more critical would’ve claimed his attention. She tested her knees, the caramel was less gummy. She was a very small cog in the wheel of Chris’ world, and if she kept her head on straight and delivered on her performance measures, he’d have no need to notice her again.

She put her hand to her lips. Except for whatever it was her mouth was doing that he thought was significant enough to pull her aside for. Maybe it was the lack of colour that got his attention. She’d been in a state leaving the house this morning, more uptight than Mia, and she’d left her makeup purse on the hall table. No touch ups almost led to a career dust up.

She looked at her watch. Four hours and fifteen minutes. And not a minute longer. She took the fire stairs down two flights to her office. The very first thing she was doing was calling home to check on Mia, and then she was going to convince herself not to panic about the possibility Chris was already lodging a complaint about her with HR.

But plans can change. The very first thing she was doing was booting Les out of her office. Les had taken up residency. “Can we do this later?”

“That bad?”

“Um. Possibly. I need to call home.” And it would be best to keep what happened to herself.

Les stood. “About that. I may have opened something on your desktop while I used your phone to check my messages.”

Les went one way around the desk, Audrey went the other. “What do you mean?”

“A mysterious live portal into another world which looked remarkably like your lounge room.”

She plonked down behind her desk and scanned her screen. The nanny cam was running. “What are you doing opening things on my desktop?”

“What are you doing with non-standard software applications, and how do I get one?”

“Go back to your own office.”

“Yours has a nicer aspect of the car park. Tell me about the camera thing first.”

Audrey rocked back in her chair and considered Les. “All right, but you tell me about two weeks ago, Saturday night. A certain invitation by a certain lust inducing tattooed builder.” She brushed her hand over her head to indicate his hairstyle.

Les rolled her eyes. “I told you. He was nice to me. Invited me out. But of course I didn’t go. I mean, why would I? He didn’t actually mean it.”