Imaginary Lines (New York Leopards 3)
Chapter Fourteen
On Wednesday morning, I’d barely walked in before Tanya popped her head out of her office and said, “Rosenfeld. In here.”
I glanced at the boys. “You told.”
Mduduzi had the grace to look guilty, while Jin just wore his normal slouchy expression. I shook my head at them and entered our boss’s office.
She looked up at me from behind her messy desk, covered in mountains and tumbleweeds of paper, and crowned by a laptop and a separate monitor. She stared above it at me in disbelief. “You know Abe Krasner.”
I felt like a recalcitrant schoolchild, and could barely keep my hands from lacing together before me. My shoulders straightened. “Yes, ma’am.”
She pinned me with the same gaze she used to interrogate sources. Though I supposed she wouldn’t call it interrogation. “And you didn’t think that was a pertinent piece of information?”
Not really. “I wouldn’t want you to have hired me based on my connections, especially when I don’t intend to exploit them.”
The disbelief in her expression didn’t dissipate. “Rosenfeld. Do you know anything about the reputation of sports media in the past twenty years?”
I didn’t bristle, but it was a close call. I nodded instead.
“And do you know how people phrase the relationship sports writers often have with sports teams?” She leaned forward, her hands clasped before her. “They say we’re in bed with the teams.”
I flushed hot all over. “I’m not sleeping with Abe!”
She shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. You’re a young, attractive woman—”
“We’re childhood friends!”
She let loose a sigh of disgust. “Oh, for Christ’s sake. You took this job to report on a childhood friend? In what world did you think you were going to be objective?”
“But I am!”
She leaned back and shook her head. “I should fire you for this, you know.”
“You can’t fire me for having a friend,” I argued, even though I had no idea whether she could or couldn’t. “That’s discrimination against...friendship.”
She waved a hand. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to fire you. I’m going to use you.”
Somehow, that didn’t make me feel any better.
* * *
At home Lucy had set about planning the dinner party with verve. “So it’s going to be in like two weeks, on the tenth. At least three of my friends are coming,” she told me, after I arrived home after my exhausting interview with Tanya. Lucy stood in the kitchen, making some strange tea. “Two of them are single guys—Hey, are you okay? You look even whiter than usual.”
I dropped my purse on the floor and leaned against the counter as I poured a glass of water. “Weird day at work.” Tanya hadn’t said how she planned to use me, but now I thought I knew what an ace in the back pocket might feel like—sat upon and suffocated.
“Weird good or weird bad?”
“Weird—weird, I guess. Bad? Odd, definitely.”
She looked at me strangely. “You’re definitely acting odd.”
* * *
The next day at work, our building threw us a tenant appreciation party. “So what is this?” I asked the guys as we took the elevator down. “Like they feed us?”
They all looked at each other and shrugged. “Yeah.”
“Last year there was a performing monkey,” Carlos said.