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She digs her elbow into my shoulder in retaliation, making me wince. As she straightens up, she pats me on the head. “You know Caleb wouldn’t mind replacing Hashem with you in a heartbeat.”
“I want to earn that position,” I tell her, dodging her hand with a scowl, my hands going to smooth my hair back down from where she’s deliberately messed up my style. “And will you please stop messing with my hair?”
She, very cheerfully, reaches out to grab my hair in a fist hold and ruins my well-maintained strands. “Do you use a bottle a day?”
I bat away her insistent hands, whining, “Stop it!” This is the only woman in front of whom I resort to such childlike behavior.
She grabs my neck in a chokehold, maliciously. “Stop using so much hair product.” She doesn’t stop until all my hair is ruined.
I kick her out, threatening to tell Lana that she’s not letting me work.
It’s only an hour later when I realize she’d completely distracted me from my worries. However, this isn’t an issue I can avoid any longer, so I make my way to Hashem’s office.
Before my promotion, I was forced into a tiny cramped office, no better than the janitor’s closet. But times change and now, my office is larger, more comfortable and despite Kendall’s half-hearted denials, I know she had something to do with this because I only got this new office a while back. Hashem was content to let me work out of that box.
Hashem is a middle-aged man who’s easy on the eyes but he has a smarmy attitude about him that is a human repellent. I honestly don’t know how he managed to hold on to this job for this long.
He’s not alone in his office.
Raymond Silverton, one of the older senior members, is sitting with him. Soft blue eyes and greying hair, Raymond is a soft-natured man and I’ve always liked him. He’s a widower and he rarely talks about his family. When I initially started working at this company, he had been my mentor.
I nod to him in greeting, before turning to Hashem. “You can’t keep rejecting applicants. At this rate, I’ll lose both the Bernard account and the Damson account!”
Hashem smirks, leaning back in his chair. “That’s unfortunate. Instead of making excuses, why don’t you work harder to hold on to those clients?”
I grit my teeth. “You were told to hire a Programming Officer for me! You were even given a budget for it.”
Hashem blinks. “Is that what the addition to the budget was for? Since I’m the head of this department, I made the executive decision to allocate that amount to hiring an assistant for myself; my workload has increased over the past few months.”
“You did what?” I ask, dangerously.
“I hired an assistant for myself.” He shrugs, a smug smile playing on his lips. “I’m afraid the department simply does not have enough to hire a Programming Officer for you.”
Rage fills me and I clench my fists.
Now Hashem narrows his eyes at me, “What? You want to go snitch to the CEO again?”
His words make me want to smash his face into the table. However, I restrain myself and open my mouth. But before I can say anything, Raymond interrupts, “Are you looking for one of those computer people, Jace?” He sounds hesitant.
I turn my head to look at him. “Do you know somebody?”
“We don’t have the budget, even if he does!” Hashem says, loudly.
Raymond shoots him a look that is laced with concern, before turning to look at me. “That’s the thing. I don’t think you’ll have to pay her. My niece did her Masters in some programming thing and she does a lot of that freelance thing that all the youngsters are into these days. But she can’t put that on her résumé. I could get her to agree to an unpaid internship, if you want.”
Hiring a freelancer is not something I enjoy because they’re usually very unreliable and I have no idea about this girl’s skill. However, one look at Hashem’s irritated face has me saying, “Tell her to come by on Monday. I’ll see if I can put her to work. I’ll want to test her skills first, of course.”
Hashem is on his feet, furious. “You can’t clear an intern into my department without my consent.”
My lips twist into a sneer. “Don’t worry. I’ll clear it with the CEO and HR.”
The HOD’s face gets red with anger.
I march out, feeling both satisfaction and annoyance. I hope this girl is as good as Raymond thinks she is. Otherwise, my ass is on the line.
It’s already late, and I decide to head home.
My apartment is a ten-minute drive from where I work and I muse whether I’ll have time to throw in some laundry.
