He felt there was a greater presence somewhere in the building watching his every move.
Kyle slid behind the wheel of the van and started the engine. He pulled away from the curb, trying to stay calm as he headed out of the parking lot. The feeling that he was being watched persisted the entire time he was on Corporate Financial Consultancy property and it didn’t diminish until he was heading to his next stop. In fact, the minute he made a right turn onto the main road into town, the feeling stopped, as if a door had been suddenly slammed shut behind him. Kyle felt it instantly in his gut, knew that he was somehow safe, and as he headed to his next stop he told himself that when he got back to the distribution center he was going to put in a request for a route change.
CHAPTER ONE
MICHELLE DOWLING KNEW she’d aced the interview and that the job was hers the minute Sam Greenburg gave her a smile that suggested his recruitment efforts were over. “In my position it’s not every day I come across somebody with a resume quite like yours.”
“Really?” Michelle made no effort to draw him out. She sat in the chair in front of his desk, her posture perfect, right leg crossed over her left, dressed impeccably in a blue power suit. It was her second interview with Sam and she’d dressed just as professionally for the first. Had put on the same performance as welclass="underline" she’d said all the right things, answered all his questions concisely, never pausing to elaborate or going off on an unrelated anecdote, asked all the right questions about the company and what the position would entail. She never used her sexuality to give her an edge, either. She dressed well, she was attractive, let her demeanor carry her through. That was her philosophy. It worked every time.
“Absolutely,” Sam said. He picked up her resume again, running through it. “It’s a nice solid mix of Business Intelligence, Information Technology, and computer graphics. It’s exactly what we’re looking for.”
Michelle tried to suppress the smile that threatened to burst across her face. “I’m glad to hear that.”
Sam Greenburg regarded her from across his large glass desktop. “Tell me something about your stint at Kaiser. You indicate you produced financial reports with Crystal. Did those include cubed reports?”
“Yes.”
Sam nodded, flipping through the resume. He was wearing a dark gray suit and his salt and pepper hair and goatee gave him more the appearance of a college professor than a corporate consultant. “And the sample you include here,” he said, pausing from looking at the resume to pluck a copy of a sample report Michelle had in her portfolio which she’d delivered to Sam two weeks ago during her first interview. The sample report consisted of fifty pages of text, bar graphs and flow charts. All professionally laid out and designed. “It’s very impressive. Something like this usually requires the work of two, sometimes three people. Not to mention a technical writer.”
“I do some technical writing, too,” Michelle said, stifling the urge to elaborate further. The excitement she was feeling as it became clear to her she was going to get the job eclipsed her common sense, but she quickly put an end to that.
“Again, I’m very impressed.” Sam put the report down on his desk and leaned forward, smiling. “There’s just a few minor details that need to be worked out and then I think we can go forward. How does that sound?”
“Great,” Michelle said.
“You indicated last time we spoke that you would be available to start immediately. Does that still stand?”
“Absolutely,” Michelle said. “I’m mostly doing 1099 contract work now and am on an assignment that ends this Friday. I don’t have anything lined up beyond that, so I can start anytime after that.”
Sam looked at his desk calendar. “Would Monday, April 3 be a problem?”
“Not at all.”
Sam looked satisfied. He stood up and Michelle rose from her seat. They shook hands over his cluttered desk. “I’ll be in touch with you by Thursday. Friday at the latest.”
“Okay,” Michelle said, so into the role of interviewee that it came natural to her. “Thank you again for the opportunity to speak with you. As I said earlier, I’m very impressed by Corporate Financial Services and I’m very eager to be a part of your team.”
“The feeling is mutual, Ms. Dowling,” Sam said, smiling. He motioned her to the door of his office and walked her out. As they walked down the hall past other offices and toward the bullpen of gray-walled cubicles, Sam said, “Corporate Financial Services is a great company to work for. I think you’ll find our corporate culture, benefits package, and career opportunities beneficial to your overall life plan. People who come on board Corporate Financial tend to make it their life work and stay for a long time. We have a very high level of employee satisfaction here, Ms. Dowling. The highest in Pennsylvania, in fact.” They reached the third floor lobby where the elevators were. Michelle pressed the down arrow button and Sam remained with her as she waited. “We have a good group of people here.”
“Yes, you do,” Michelle said, thinking about the technical team she’d met with during her first interview. The technical group was made up of men and women her age and older, and the team leader had been a jokester. She’d felt relaxed and at ease with them immediately.
“And the commute won’t be too long for you, either,” Sam said.
“No, it won’t. I can get here through back roads.”
The elevator dinged and Sam smiled as the doors opened and Michelle shook his hand a final time. “Thank you again for the interview Mr. Greenberg.”
“I’ll be in touch,” Sam said as she stepped into the elevator.
As she rode the elevator to the lobby, Michelle let out a sigh of relief. She felt tingly; giddy.
I’ve got it, she thought.
She’d hoped she would get the job the minute she finished the first interview. In a way it was a dream job because it would allow her to focus on her strengths—computer graphic design and technical writing. The financial reporting via Crystal Reports would be a minor hindrance, but only to the extent that she didn’t get a particular joy out of that type of work. She could do it, was very good at it in fact. But she held no overwhelming interest or passion for it. The other two portions of the job she could do in her sleep.
The official title for the job was Business Intelligence Design Architect. Whatever the hell that meant. The official job description, without all the corporate mega-speak, was that they wanted somebody who would be able to design and create financial reports using Crystal Reports (this, in itself, required knowledge of relational databases, most likely Oracle or SQL); compose technical documentation to go with the financial reports and gear it toward a wide variety of people; and create, design, and publish eye-catching manuals and web publications. Basically she’d be the back end support for the main Business Intelligence designers and sales people. The company itself was a financial and business consultant firm who assisted their clients—most of them large corporations like Wal-Mart, Microsoft, Prudential and other powerhouse firms—in maintaining their bottom line and running a cleaner, tighter ship. There would be some travel required, but she was used to that. They were looking for somebody with experience and skills in all of the main things the job required, as well as a Bachelor’s Degree in Business, Accounting, Finance, Computer Science, or five years of related experience. She lacked a degree, but had more experience and knowledge than most college graduates. Plus, she’d spent the better part of a decade at jobs that required Bachelor’s or Master’s degrees as a minimum requirement and had excelled in all of them.