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“Outstanding! Then you can head out for the day.”
It was nice to get to go home an entire hour early when I finished my work. That was rather unprecedented in my working experience. As soon as I made it home, I wrote down everything I remembered from the documents I’d read that day. I remembered a lot more because I’d had the time to really think about it, but I still felt like my list was incomplete and inaccurate. I just hoped it did some good, even though I doubted they’d given me anything truly critical.
Rod and Marcia came in together right after Gemma left for her spin class. I stopped myself from handing my information to Rod right away when I saw how grim he looked. “It looks like I’ve joined the club,” he said, sitting heavily on the sofa.
Nine
“They approached you?” I asked eagerly. “How?”
“It was like with you—they came up to me when I was at lunch and handed me a card. Only they didn’t ask me to apply for a job. The guy made it sound like he was with a recruitment agency and wanted me to give particular consideration to the job candidates he proposed. I told him to send me the résumés and I’d see what I could do, but I couldn’t make any promises. He said it would be extremely beneficial for me to do what I could. I talked to the boss about it, and he agreed with you, that I should do it. I hate it, though.” He shuddered and pounded his fist on his thigh. “I hate the idea of giving people preference because they belong to some group.”
“Isn’t that what happens with university alumni, and fraternities, and secret societies at Ivy League universities?” Marcia asked.
“They generally aren’t giving kickbacks or threats. And I’ve tried to avoid that kind of bias when I hire. That’s why we’re a stronger company now. I’ve tried recruiting outside the usual areas, and that’s given us some fresh perspectives and new customer bases. This is sending us back to the Dark Ages.”
“Which is ironic, since they pride themselves on keeping up with the times,” I said. I handed him the list of things I remembered. “Here’s today’s work. Was there anything in what I gave you yesterday?”
“Yeah, actually there was. Several of them were our customers who’ve recently canceled orders for spell development. Family members for two of the individuals recently went missing. The rest didn’t seem to relate to anything we know of.”
“It’s possible that I didn’t remember correctly,” I said. “This list should be better, since I had a chance to concentrate more on remembering. Do you know what you’re going to do about these things?”
“Right now, we’re just watching and waiting.”
“Don’t wait too long. I have a feeling this is all part of some bigger plan, and we don’t want to let them get too much done.”
“But you don’t know what that plan might be?”
“I’ve been there two days,” I reminded him. “But while I have you, can you take a look at the company phone and make sure it’s not enchanted? I need to know how safe it is for me to talk around it.”
“I’m not as good at this sort of thing as Owen is, but I’ll give it a shot.”
I took the phone out of my purse and set it on the coffee table in front of him. He waved his hands over it, his eyes half closed, then shook his head. “I’m not picking up anything. It would be normal for them to be able to tell who you talked to and when, but it’s not enchanted to spy on you when you’re not using it.”
“Whew,” I said, sighing audibly. “That does make me feel a little better. They’re still crazy paranoid, but at least I don’t have Big Brother with me at all times.”
It would have been nice, though, if I’d had a way to bug Roger’s office. Then again, I couldn’t tell that anything was actually happening there. I never saw him meeting with anyone, never noticed anyone coming to or going from his office when I approached it, never saw outsiders in our hallway. We may as well have been in our own isolated little pod rather than a part of a larger organization.
A week or so later, Trish brought that up when we were both getting coffee in the break room. “Have you ever worked in a place that didn’t have meetings?” she asked.
“Only in my wildest dreams. Maybe we’re just lucky, or else they don’t yet trust us with meetings because we’re still on probation.”
“Yeah, but have you even seen Roger go to a meeting?”
“No, but his office is in another time zone.” Possibly literally, since I felt like there was something funny about this building.
“True,” she said, nodding. “I guess maybe I’m still not used to the whole magic thing.”
My paranoia levels skyrocketed when I got an e-mail soon after returning to my office announcing a meeting in half an hour in the conference room. A moment later, Trish came into my office, glancing over her shoulder like she was making sure she hadn’t been followed. “Were they spying on us?” she asked in a whisper. “Because this is just freaky. One minute we’re all ‘why don’t they have meetings?’ and the next minute they’re announcing a meeting.”
“Maybe it’s a coincidence?” I ventured.
She wagged her finger at me. “Oh no, don’t you try that. I can see on your face that you’re just as freaked as I am. I wonder what this meeting is about. The first elimination?”
“Surely they wouldn’t do that at a meeting.”
“Or they’re going to tell us how many companies they’ve been able to take over with these shady contracts we’ve been checking.”
“If we’re lucky, there will be cake.”
