Cruel (The Buck Boys Heroes 2)

Chapter Eight

Juliet

“Who wants to speak to me?” I ask Hugo as he stands in front of my desk.

He leans closer to lower his voice so my co-workers in the cubicles around me won’t hear him. “Mr. Marks.”

I study his lips to see if the movement matches the name that just fell from them.

It’s not that I can read lips. I can’t, but somewhere between Hugo’s mouth and my ears, the name he said got jumbled because there’s no way that owner of Marks Creative wants to talk to me.

I’m one of the lowest-ranked employees on staff.

Hugo has tried to boost my confidence by telling me that I’m the lead junior writer for RumorMel. That would mean a lot more if there were other junior writers on staff.

I’m the only one. My co-workers have all been working the job for at least two years. I just passed the six month mark.

I glance down at the pink and red floral dress I’m wearing. I would have paired it with something other than my black leather jacket and low-heeled black boots if I knew I was going to have an audience with the owner of the company.

“Juliet,” Hugo stresses my name. “You need to come with me now. Mr. Marks is waiting for you.”

I stay seated behind my desk because I don’t have any confidence that my legs will work at this moment. That’s because my knees are shaking. “Why?”

“Why what?” He shoves a hand through his red curly hair.

“Why does he want to see me?” I narrow my eyes. “Did I mess up? Was it the pictures of Corla Berletti’s engagement ring? My source has been supplying me with information for months. I can’t reveal who it is, though. If that means I’m going to lose this job, so be it. I have to stick by my principles.”

I can tell that he’s fighting to hold in a smile. “I’m impressed with your loyalty to Brad, but this isn’t about those pictures.”

That jolts me to my feet. “You know Brad?”

He laughs. “How do you think Brad found you?”

I assumed it was my call out on social media for anyone with information on my first story. That involved a lost poodle that belonged to a Broadway star. Brad sent me a cryptic message about a doggie in a window with a snapshot of a poodle in the window of a townhouse on the Upper East Side.

I followed that tip and found the dog.

The woman who owned the townhouse lived a block from the Broadway star and took the dog in on a snowy night. She’d already reached out to the dog’s owner by the time I showed up on her stoop.

Still, I met up with Brad at a coffee shop, slipped him one hundred dollars for his help, and we became fast friends.

“You sent him my way,” I say with a slight grin. “That’s why you always approve my petty cash requests for my informant.”

“Brad is either a one hundred or five hundred dollar source even though he could be charging ten or twenty times that.” He smirks. “He’s been lending us a hand for a few years now.”

I sigh. “He’s fun to work with.”

“Very,” Hugo agrees with a nod. “Are you ready, Juliet?”

That yanks me back to this moment in time and the meeting I’m supposed to attend.

I round my desk. “Do you know why Mr. Marks wants to see me?”

He nods. “I do, but he wants to explain the reason to you.”

I fall in step behind him as we head toward the elevator. The executive offices of Marks Creative are on the top floor of this office tower.

RumorMel’s offices are five floors below.

Hugo jabs his finger into the elevator call button. “You have something special, Juliet.”

I glance at him. “What do you mean?”

“Your drive.” He smiles, and it carries to his kind blue eyes. “You remind me of myself when I was first starting out.”

“That means a lot to me, Hugo.”

He nods. “I’m glad to see your forehead healed up just fine, but you might need another bandage after this meeting.”

As cryptic as that is, I piece it together just as the elevator doors slide open. “You think I’m going to be in a celebratory mood after this meeting.”

Waving me ahead of him so I can board the lift first, he grins. “I know you will be.”

As the doors slide shut behind us after he pushes the button for the top floor, I glance at his profile. “Is that the only hint I’m getting?”

“You’re the investigative journalist.” He perks both of his eyebrows. “Surely, you can draw your own conclusion based on the clues I’ve dropped.”

I look up to see the numbers edging up as we make our journey to Mr. Marks’s office. “It’s really good news, isn’t it?”

He leans closer to drop his voice to a whisper. “You didn’t hear it from me, but yes. It is damn good news for you.”