The elevator door opened, and I ran right into Dan, registering belatedly that he had a phone to his ear, his face scrunched into a scowl, in the middle of a sentence.
“…solve all your problems, asshole—Beauty!”
Maybe it was because his was the first familiar face I’d seen since arriving in Seattle. Or maybe it was because Roland had been just so goddamn mean to me.
Either way, and I wasn’t proud of it, I launched myself at Dan and buried my teary face in his chest and cried.
“What’s happened, Beauty?” he asked, soothing hands rubbing my back.
“Daniel? Answer me. Dan!” The voice in his ear, the cellphone still connected to the call. I knew that voice—hoarse, low, demanding. He was talking to Roland. I jerked away.
“Call you back,” Dan said, slipping the phone into his pocket. “Beauty? Are you all right?”
“It’s nothing,” I said, quickly wiping tears and very likely melting mascara from my cheeks. “I’m just…I’m going now.”
“Going now?” He checked his watch. “We’re not even halfway through the workday. Where are you going?”
“Just going,” I said, backing away from him, circling around until I had a clear shot at the exit. “This place isn’t for me—just like college wasn’t, either.”
“Everybody eventually figures out where their place is,” Dan said, turning to face me. “You’re not exempt from that, you know. If your place isn’t here, where is it? It’s not in Houston anymore. You and I both know that.”
I flinched at hearing the name of the city where I grew up, the outskirts of which had been my playground, where Caro and my parents were buried.
“I have to go,” I said, my legs moving faster and faster until I was running again.
“You can’t run forever!” I thought I heard Dan call, but I couldn’t be sure. I was outside in the air, breathing deeply, away from the suffocating atmosphere of Shepard Shipments. I covered my face in my hands, pressing my fingers against my eyes so hard I saw stars.
“Hey, it’s you!”
I looked up to see the vendor from the newspaper kiosk across the street, pointing at me, livid.
“It’s you, the newspaper stealer!” he yelled. “Hey, newspaper stealer! I see you!”
It was past time to get the fuck out of here.
Chapter 5
I drove around the city aimlessly, letting the stoplights dictate my path, until I realized I was wasting valuable gas that I’d probably need on the road. I was leaving here. I didn’t need any of this drama, not with the drama that had plagued my life up until this point. How much rancor was I going to have to put up with until everyone just left me alone?
I parked where I could see the water and stared out at the boats drifting in and out of the harbor, ferrying people to God knew where. They probably all had a purpose, every last one of them, and I didn’t. I was living in my car, unable to decide just where I needed to be.
What would happen if I ran down that slip and jumped into the cold sea? I could really disappear, then, just swimming and swimming and swimming out, in a perfectly straight line, bobbing on the waves until I couldn’t swim anymore and just drifted with the tides and currents, face lifted toward the sky, engulfed in nothingness.
Why was I even here? What had I set out to do?
I remembered Dan had piqued my curiosity at the bar. Something hadn’t added up about his story of wanting me to work for his family’s company, and I’d been bound and determined to figure out just what it was. Was that the only thing motivating me? Or was it the troubling fact that he knew much more about me than he should’ve, like the name of my college, when I’d dropped out, and my various movements that made me writhe my way across the country from Texas to Washington state.
I’d wanted to know why he gave a shit about me. I was sure there were many people much more qualified than I was to work at Shepard Shipments. So why had Dan followed my progress across the country? Why had he said that Roland had kept me in his mind after all this time?
As much as I wanted to drift away, to forget and be forgotten, I knew that I’d never figure out what I wanted to know if I simply left Seattle, left Shepard Shipments without trying to ferret out just what they wanted with me.
And if I hated my job, it was that much better. I deserved to hate it, deserved to suffer. This could be just another stage of my penance for what I’d caused on that dark country rode that night.
I heaved a sigh and started the car again, looking longingly toward the horizon, where the sea met the sky. That’s where I really wanted to be, in the place just beyond that, in the nothing place. Maybe, once I investigated Shepard Shipments to my satisfaction, I could go there. Simply sink into that blissful nothing and forget about everything.
Just not today.
No, today I needed to find my way back to the Shepard Shipments building, get my cowed ass back upstairs, and figure out what I needed to do to avoid a train wreck like today tomorrow. I was going to have to suck it up and walk calmly past all of the people I’d run out in front of and pretend like everything was just fine and dandy.
I took a deep breath, cleaned the last of the smeared makeup off my face and went in an entrance that avoided the newspaper vendor. One challenge at a time.
“Um, Ms. Hart? Ms. Beauty Hart?” The lobby receptionist was waving me toward the desk. I approached, my feet heavy with dread. Had I been fired and banned from the building for my emotional outburst? It would serve me right, but in all fairness, Roland had been the one to burst first.
“I’m Beauty Hart,” I said, wishing—not for the first time—that I wasn’t.
“Mr. Shepard sent this down for you,” she said, handing me a manila envelope. “With instructions that you open it immediately.”
I sighed and pried up the prongs fastening the envelope shut. There was a single sheet of paper inside and fastened to it with a paper clip was a credit card. I frowned. What was this supposed to be? Severance?
“Beauty,” the letter began, the writing cramped and hard to read. Did Roland actually right this himself? It was easier to imagine him dictating to Myra. “It’s fucking unacceptable to me that one of the employees of Shepard Shipments is living out of her car. We maintain a sense of pride around here, and if you’re going to continue to work at my company, we’re going to have to work to elevate your situation. Take this card and use it to buy whatever you need. This includes additional clothes, toiletries, an apartment, food, a cellphone, a laptop, and everything else you think might make you a more successful part of this team. There is no cap on the card. It can’t be maxed out. Don’t return until you, at the very least, have a roof over your head.”
His flourishing signature ended the letter, and I took the credit card in my hand and examined it. The name it was registered under was Roland Shepard. Had he literally given me his own credit card? I wasn’t about to fucking take this. No way.
I made a move for the elevators, but the receptionist cleared her throat loudly.
“Ms. Hart?” I turned. “Mr. Shepard also said that you weren’t supposed to go back upstairs until you’d completed the tasks he’d given you.”
“Yes, of course,” I said, plastering a fake smile over my face. “But there’s a small problem that I need to address first. Just part of the instructions that weren’t clear.” That was a lie. I was going to go up there and toss this credit card in his ugly face and tell him just where he could stick it. I didn’t want his charity. I’d refuse it, a billionaire’s violent temper tantrum be damned.