Page 4 of Open To Negotiation

Warren let out a deep sigh. “Theodore, it’s frankly disrespectful to make me even ask, you should have done it already. I’ve arranged for you to get a tour around one of them today for lunch.”

Fuck. I didn’t think this day could get any worse.

3

Quinn

Running late was one of the things I hated most in this world. If I wasn’t ten minutes early, then I was late.

I’d made a stop on the way to the office this morning because once a week I liked to treat myself to a fancy coffee. Caffeine was one of my main food groups and the fancy ones gave me a serious hit of dopamine.

But the coffee shop had been busy and they missed putting my order in, so after patiently waiting in line for ten minutes, I finally asked the barista about it. She apologized and got to work on my drink. But that had put me behind by fifteen minutes and I’d already left for work a little too late because I couldn’t stop hitting the snooze button this morning.

So now, here I was speed walking to the office while chugging my coffee. Not the best plan I’ll admit, but caffeine was necessary.

My phone beeped in my pocket and rather than wait the three minutes until I was in my office, I decided trying to juggle another thing in my hands was the way to go.

As I reached for my phone, my coffee holding arm rammed into someone’s chest. The cup got knocked to my left and splattered on the ground.

I dropped my shoulders and let out a sigh, looking at the nine-dollar puddle of my latte covering the sidewalk.

“Damn it.” I looked behind me at the man that I’d bumped into, but he had just kept walking. If he’d said an apology, I hadn’t heard it. At least I managed to avoid getting anything on myself.

I couldn’t decide if this was a good or bad omen for the rest of my day.

“Quinn!”

I closed my eyes and took a breath as my manager bellowed at me from his office. The whole company was on an internal messaging system but for some reason he preferred to yell at me, without even looking to see if I was at my desk.

The coffee had been the start of a shitty day and my boss yelling at me was something I should’ve expected given how things had been going. Plus, he was an egotistical prick.

I pushed away from my desk, James shooting me a sympathetic look. Managers and upper-level employees all had offices surrounding the bullpen on three walls, the rest of us lowly employees had desks in an open workspace.

There wasn’t any separation between you and the person next to you, which is how James and I had become friends. He sat right next to me two years ago and our commiseration over work turned into after work drinks and occasionally seeing each other on the weekends and sending funny videos on social media.

I weaved my way past my coworkers to get to Richard’s open door. Richard Walker had been with the company for ten years and had made his way up to a VP level role even though he only managed to get anything done because of people like me. He took the credit for all our work, left most days before three, and took clients golfing at least once a week but never got any new business from any of the rounds he played. I stepped into his office; he didn’t even look up from his cell phone.

He was forty-nine years old, greying blond hair that he combed to try and hide his bald spots.

It wasn’t working.

His blue shirt didn’t do much for his pale complexion, but he wore one every day tucked into his black pants. He tried to look expensive, but he wasn’t fooling anyone.

I didn’t know much about him aside from him having a wife and two kids, the man wasn’t one to share information with people he believed were beneath him, and in his eyes, I was definitely that.

“Mr. Walker?” I asked as I stood waiting for him to notice me. Even after three years he hadn’t asked to be called by his first name like most of the VPs at the company.

He was a dick.

He finally looked up at me. “Ah, Quinn.”

I gave him a tight smile and waited until he met my eyes. Another thing Richard liked, to ogle women. It was annoying but aside from looking too long he never said or did anything overt. He was friends with one of the owners of the company and from what I’d heard, the one person who had ever commented on his wandering eye, was fired.

I was wearing a skirt that hit me mid-calf with a respectable slit on one side, a black blazer, black T-shirt tucked in and a pair of white runners, nothing crazy. Richard never cared, though.

I had left my red hair down and curled loosely and put minimal makeup on as always. We were a professional environment, but we were also in marketing, they expected a certain level of class to impress our clients. Which was fine with me, I loved getting dressed up.

“I need you to clear your schedule for today from eleven thirty until one thirty.”