AllFreeNovel
Share Us
CHAPTER1
Marlee
Iwas on the phone with a client when I spotted my boss standing in the doorway of his office, and I could immediately tell that something was wrong. He was watching me with a deep frown on his face, his brow furrowed.
Earl Williams was the top realtor in Brooklyn and had been for the last three years in a row. Landing the job of secretary at his firm was a stroke of good luck for me. The pay was good and it worked well with my school schedule. Going to college and holding down a full-time job wasn’t easy, but I was making it work. Just two more years, and I would graduate with a bachelor’s degree in business.
I finished writing down a message for Mr. Williams’ colleague, the other realtor in the office that was at an open house today. The moment I hung up the phone, he spoke.
“Marlee, can you come into my office, please? I need a word.”
Dread pooled in my stomach as I stood, smoothing the wrinkles out of my modest skirt. Mr. Williams was a man that I’d always thought of as permanently in a good mood. In the year that I’d worked here, I’d only ever seen him angry one time, and that was when a man broke into one of the houses listed with the firm and vandalized it just before a showing.
But his cheerful disposition was gone now. As I stepped into the office, he closed the door firmly behind me. My feeling of unease grew. I had already had a hell of a bad week, and I had a suspicion that it was about to get worse. This was not what I needed on my last day of work before a week-long vacation.
“Take a seat,” Mr. Williams said, and I complied, sitting in the straight-backed chair in front of his desk and folding my hands in my lap to help keep myself from fidgeting.
“Is something wrong?” I asked once he’d settled into his own chair, facing me.
He didn’t reply immediately, letting out a long sigh as his shoulders slumped. Taking off his round glasses, he rubbed his eyes.
“This is...difficult to discuss. But it’s come to my attention that there are pictures of you online…”
My heart sank and I suddenly felt like I might be sick. This couldn’t be happening. My boss knew about this? What a complete nightmare.
“It wasn’t me,” I blurted out, sitting up straighter and meeting his eyes. I wanted him to see that I wasn’t lying. “I wouldneverput naked pictures of myself on a website like that. Or at all. Onanywebsite. I mean, I’m not the type of person that would put herself out there like that…”
I was rambling, and I knew it. The situation was all just so humiliating, but I never would have thought that it would affect my work life.
“My ex-boyfriend did it,” I continued when he didn’t cut me off. “I broke up with him a month ago, and apparently he thought that a good revenge would be to shareprivatepictures on some free porn website. He even sent me the link yesterday to make sure that I knew what he’d done.”
It turned out that Brian was a psycho. I sure knew how to pick ‘em.
“Be that as it may, we have a serious problem here.”
“How do you even know about it?” I asked, internally cringing as I imagined him perusing the website alone in his office and coming across them.
“I received a phone call while you were at lunch. Apparently, one of our clients uses that website, and he commented on the pictures with the name of your workplace. The firm is now connected to those pictures, and I’m sure that you can understand why that’s bad for business.”
I could, but it was so unfair. I didn’t post those pictures or attach the firm’s name to them. It was bad enough thatmyname was on them.
“What are you saying?” I asked, my throat tight as I valiantly tried holding back tears of frustration.
“Honestly, I have to consider what’s best for the company. We work with families, people that will not be happy if they learn that we are employing someone that is baring it all online. You know how the internet is. People can find out anything, and I can’t risk losing clients over this.”
My stomach churned. “A-are you...firing me?”
It was impossible to keep the hurt out of my voice. Sure, I was just a secretary, but I was a hard-working employee. And I always thought that Mr. Williams liked me.
“I don’t want to,” he admitted, brushing his grey hair off his forehead with that deep frown still in place. At least he seemed as unhappy about all of this as I was. “But you have to find a way of getting this under control, or I’ll have to consider letting you go.”
Get it under control? What the hell did that mean? What was I supposed to do?
“Why don’t you go ahead and leave early today,” he suggested in a tone of voice that made it clear he wasn’t going to take no for an answer. “Get an early start on your vacation. We’ll talk when you get back.”
There was no room for argument, and even if there was, what would I say? So, I stood and practically fled the office. Going back to my desk, I grabbed my purse and even contemplated just packing up my stuff. I couldn’t see a way that I would avoid getting fired over this.
No.I wasn’t going to give in that easily. I had to at least try to fix this awful turn of events.
