Ignite Me (The Annihilate Me Series) (24 page)

CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO

When I returned
home that afternoon, Rhoda wasn’t at the apartment.
 
Not that I expected her to be there
because Rhoda worked seven days a week, and with the tourist season in full
force during the summer, weekends were her best days for making money.

But when she
did arrive home just past six, she came into the living room in a white smock,
faded blue jeans, a chunky red necklace around her neck, and a matching
red-and-white kerchief on her head.
 
She gave me a kiss on the forehead, and the dreadlocks that weren’t
secured by her kerchief fell into my face.

“Sorry about
that,” she said as she brushed them aside.

“I think I’ve
been whipped enough this weekend, Rhoda.”

She batted her
eyelashes at me.
 
“I know.
 
And just imagine if it had been Brock
doing the whipping now.”

“I don’t think
I could handle it.
 
At this point,
my body needs a rest.”

“We’ll discuss
all of your escapades in a moment,” she said as she plopped heavily onto the
sofa opposite me.
 
“But first I have
to tell you that since you came to New York, I don’t think we’ve ever spent so
much time apart.
 
It’s been strange
not having you here.
 
And I’m not
going to deny it, toots—it was lonely without you.”

“I’m sorry,” I
said.

She waved a
hand in the air.
 
“Look, it is what
it is.
 
And that wasn’t meant to be
a guilt trip.
 
I just wanted you to
know how much I missed you.”
 
She
lifted her feet onto the top of the coffee table, held out her right hand
straight in front of her as if she was studying her nails, and then she said in
a light voice, “So, you know—tell me everything. . . .”

“Let’s just say
that the past two days have been an emotional rollercoaster.
 
But before I go into great detail, how
much do you already know?”

“Not all of
it,” she said.
 
“I rarely know all
of it.
 
And I have to say that this
time,
 
even though we’re together in
the same room and there’s a formidable amount of energy flowing between us
right now, I’m only getting broken pieces of what you experienced.
 
I’m assuming that’s because on some
level, you might be feeling conflicted about what happened between Brock and
you, and that you haven’t completely sorted out exactly what you feel.
 
Thus the broken imagery I’m seeing,
which suggests confusion.
 
But I’m
not sure, so why don’t I get each of us a glass of wine, and then we’ll talk?”

“Yes, please.”

“Give me two
secs.”

When she
returned with the wine, we lifted our glasses to each other before we sipped.

“So, spill it,
lovey.
 
Tell me what you want to
tell me.”

“I always tell
you everything.”

“Then tell me
everything.”

I told her
about our weekend—from the sex straight down to the serious conversations
we’d shared.
 
I told her that I
thought I was falling in love with him, and how absurd that seemed to me.
 
I told her that after knowing him for
such a short period of time, what I was feeling couldn’t possibly be love, so I
figured it could just be lust.
 
And
then I told her when I said that to her, it felt like a lie to me because I
knew in my heart that what Brock and I had shared over those two days was more
than mere lust, even if I didn’t want to hear myself saying it out loud at this
point.
 
So I admitted that to her.
 
I told her that the beginnings of love
were what I felt in my heart, even though the logical side of my brain was
telling me to hold back.
 
Don’t go
so fast.
 
That I’ll only get
hurt.
 
And on and on and on.

So I asked
Rhoda for her insight.

“Look,” she
said.
 
“There is no time limit on
love, OK?
 
When people come to me
and ask me about love at first sight, I know for a fact that sometimes it’s the
real deal, toots.
 
Other times, it
just isn’t.
 
I’ve been through this
too many times to count.
 
There are
times when it’s obvious that love will take much longer to grow between two
people, and that they should stick it out and wait for that to happen—if
they want to.
 
Other times, when
someone comes to me and wonders if a certain man or woman they feel for will
one day return their love, I sense that they won’t—and then I ask them if
they really want to know the truth.
 
If they do, I’ll tell them, even though it kills me that I’m stealing
away their hope.
 
I can continue on
with all of the different variations of how love blossoms and grows and dies
between couples, Madison, but what I’m saying to you now is that there is no
definition when it comes to how and when love strikes.
 
It can indeed happen at a first
glance.
 
It can indeed occur over a
mere weekend.
 
But for some, it can also
take years to take hold.
 
Worse for
others is that it might not happen at all.”

“Do you know
what’s to come of this?”

“I do.
 
But we have our agreement, and I think
it would be a terrible idea to tell you anything.
 
You either need to go forward with this
or not.
 
Give yourself completely to
him or don’t.
 
If he tells you what
he feels—and if you’re feeling the same—then you need to decide
right then and there if he is the man you’ve been waiting for.”

“And what if he
never tells me?”

“You’re a
modern woman,” she said.
 
“If he
doesn’t, take matters into your own hands and tell him how you feel.
 
Ask him how he feels.
 
If you feel the same, great.
 
If you don’t, well, at least you had a
lovely weekend.
 
And I’m not being
snide when I say that, Madison, because I think that you needed that
weekend.
 
You finally trusted
someone again.
 
You opened the door
to your heart and let another man in knowing the risks.
 
So, brava!
 
At this point, it’s all up to you.
 
This is your fate, and it’s also your
life.
 
And at some point, you’ll
need to take charge of it.
 
Or not.
 
He might make a declaration on his
own.
 
Who knows?”

“You do.”

“I do.
 
And I’m here to tell you that, out of
respect for you and your own personal growth as a woman, I’m keeping mum about
all of it.”

CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE

Brock and I
didn’t talk on Sunday, and though I missed hearing his voice, I understood that
he didn’t need any interruptions from me.
 
He had to finish rewriting his report for Alex, and because he was under
the gun, I knew that he needed to focus.
 

If at any point
he felt that he needed to reach out to me and bend my ear for any reason, he
knew that he could call me.
 
But he
didn’t, so I had to assume that things were going smoothly for him, which was
good because I knew it would be better for him if he came through for Alex on
his own.

So on Monday
morning when I arrived at Wenn for work, it was with butterflies in my
stomach.
 
I’d be seeing Brock again,
and that alone made me happy.

When I arrived
on the fifty-first floor, I dipped my head into Blackwell’s office to say good
morning, but she wasn’t there, though her desk light was on.
 
She must have stepped out, so I went to
my desk, started my computer, and was just getting settled in and preparing for
whatever the day would bring when Brock came into the office.

When he saw
that Blackwell wasn’t in her office, he turned to look at me with a twinkle in
his eye.
 
I saw him look fleetingly
around the office for other signs of life, and then, without warning, he
quickly moved toward me and gave me a chaste kiss on the lips before he walked
into his office as if nothing had happened between us.

But my
hammering heart told another story.

It was then
that Blackwell returned.

“Madison,” she
said as she stopped by my desk.
 
She
was wearing yet another Chanel suit, but this one was black, which surprised me
because it was summer.

“Good morning,
Ms. Blackwell.”

She folded her
arms in front of her and studied me.

“Is it?” she
said.
 
“I wonder.
 
But I do need to ask—why is your
lipstick smeared?”

Oh, shit. . . .

“Is it?”

“In fact, it is.”

I watched her
glance over toward Brock’s office, where his light was on, and then she turned
back to me.
 

“I need you in
my office,” she said.
 
“But not
before you do each of us a favor and fix that train wreck of a face of yours
first.”

When she said
that to me, there was such coldness in her voice, I felt a chill run down my
spine.
 
I reached for my bag,
removed my compact, opened it and looked at myself in the mirror.
 
Brock had indeed smeared my lipstick, some
of which was now on the side of my mouth, as if I’d somehow been slashed with a
knife.
 
With a sense of haste and
trepidation, I blotted my skin with my makeup pad, touched up the area in
question, added a fresh swipe of lipstick, and didn’t dare look across the room
at Brock when I stood and smoothed the skirt of the yellow suit I’d worn that
day.

Blackwell,
after all, was sitting ramrod-straight in her office chair—and she was
looking straight at me.

“Close the door
behind you,” she said when I walked into her office.

What in the
hell is this about?

I closed the
door.

“Why is your
suit so loose?” she asked.

“I’m sorry,” I
said.
 
“I know it’s a size too
big.
 
When I bought it, I was a size
larger than I am now.
 
But I thought
that it looked OK before I left for work.
 
As I’ve told you before, right now I just don’t have a lot of clothes to
work with.
 
But once I get paid, I
can assure you that will change.”

“Save me your
tears.
 
What size is that suit?”

“A seven.”

“And you’re a
six now?”

“Between a four
and a six, but probably closer to a six.”

“Then I suggest
that you find yourself a tailor if you’re going to show up to work looking like
that in this town, because I can tell you this, girl, not many bosses will put
up with that kind of sloppiness, least of all me.”

Was I about to
be fired?
 
She’d just said, “in this
town,” not “at Wenn.”
 
What in the
hell had I done to piss her off?
 
On
Friday, I thought that we’d parted on good terms.
 
She’d even given me a compliment, for
God’s sake.

“Take a seat,”
she said.
 
“You and I are about to
have a little chit-chat.”

“Have I done
something wrong?” I asked.

“Here’s how
this is going to play out, Madison.
 
I don’t want to hear another word from you unless I ask you a direct
question.
 
Is that understood?”

“All right,” I
said as I sat down opposite her.

She leaned
forward in her seat, put her elbows on her desk, and rested her chin on her
interlocked fingers.
 
“How was your
weekend?” she asked in a voice that was so sugary sweet, it could have rotted
my teeth.

“My weekend?”

“Yes—your
weekend.
 
How was it?”

“It was
lovely.”

“Was it,
Madison?
 
Really, Madison?
 
Tell me, darling, in what ways was it
lovely?”

If I answered
truthfully, she’d can my ass.

“That’s a
personal question,” I said to her.
 

And when I said
that, the ice returned to her voice.
 
“Oh, but we’re about to get very personal, my dear.”

Everyone has a
breaking point—and at that moment, mine was triggered.
 
I sat up as straight as she was sitting
now, I folded one leg over the other, and then I met her gaze with my own.

“I think we
both know that you, as the executive vice president of human resources, have no
legal access to my personal life,” I said.

Blackwell’s
eyes widened when I said that, but only for an instant.
 
“Well, look at you,” she said as she
leaned back in her chair.
 
“Finally
showing a bit of backbone—and at the eleventh hour no less.
 
You’ve been so meek and polite since we
first met, I hardly thought you had it in you.”

“When it comes
to business, I’m a dedicated professional.
 
But when it comes to my personal life, I’ll protect that like a
pitbull.
 
You think you know me, Ms.
Blackwell, but I’m here to tell you that unless we become friendly with each
other, which is looking increasingly doubtful, you will never fully know
me—just as I will never fully know you.”

“Well, at least
that’s true,” she said.
 
“You don’t
know me—though you claim that you do because of all of that ridiculous
research you’ve done on me.
 
But I
can tell you that you don’t know a thing about me, Madison, as you’ll find out
for yourself by the end of the day.”

What’s
happening at the end of the day?

“But fine,” she
said.
 
“You were off-hours over the
weekend, and those hours are your own.”
 
She narrowed her eyes at me.
 
“Or were they your own, especially when you and Brock spent Friday and
Saturday night at the Plaza Hotel on Wenn’s dime?”

“When we did
what
?”
I asked.

“So, you deny
it?” she said.

“I deny that we
put anything on Wenn’s dime.”

“Is that so?”

“It is so.
 
I don’t deny that I spent the weekend
with Brock, not that it’s any of your business.
 
But I deny that we charged any of it to
Wenn.
 
I saw Brock hand one of the
desk clerks his own credit card when we checked in.
 
I know for a fact that he paid for that
room himself, and frankly, I don’t see how any of this concerns you.”

“Here’s how it
concerns me, Madison.
 
And here’s
also how it concerns Alex and Jennifer, whom I just met with about this
particular dilemma when it came to our attention this morning.
 
Wenn has an account with the Plaza.
 
We place visiting guests there when Alex
is striking a deal with out-of-town visitors.
 
The suites we offer are very high-end,
which you no doubt appreciated.”

At that moment,
I remembered Brock saying when we toured the suite that we must have received
an upgrade.
 
Now I knew why—in
a way, we had.
 
But how dare this
woman even suggest that Brock or I would do anything as underhanded as stealing
from Wenn?
 
That kind of accusation
was something I’d never stand for.
 
Yes, I needed this job, but when my moral character came under attack,
that’s when all bets were off.
 
I’d
protect it fiercely, and I’d walk away from Wenn in a hot second if she was
going to question my ethics.
 
Wordlessly, I didn’t just stare at her—I stared her down, willing
her to go on.

And she did.

“Apparently,
when you and Brock checked into the hotel for your sordid little weekend
rendezvous, Brock was asked if he worked for Wenn Enterprises, which he told
them he did.
 
After a discussion
with the front-desk manager this morning, it was decided that a mistake was
made by the clerk who checked you into your room.
 
That person assumed that Wenn should pay
the bill, not Brock.
 
At this point,
the damage has been settled, and Brock’s credit card will be charged in full—but
not Wenn’s account.”

“If that’s the
case, then why am I sitting here talking to you about this?” I said, bristling
with rage.
 
“You’ve already settled
the matter.
 
It’s finished.
 
You have no reason to question me, so
why have you dragged me in here?
 
In
an effort to humiliate me?
 
Belittle
me?
 
I’m sorry, Ms. Blackwell, but
that’s not going to happen.
 
I meant
it when I said that I had a wonderful weekend.
 
And I believe that going forward, I’ll
be having many more fantastic weekends with Brock, whether I work here or not.”

And at that,
Blackwell threw up her hands.

“None of this
is about you leaving Wenn.”

“Then what’s it
about?”

“It’s about
what
you
said to
me
when you first interviewed with me.”

“What could I
possibly have said to you that has anything to do with my personal life?”

“Seriously,
Madison?
 
Have you no memory,
Madison?
 
Allow me to take you back
to that day.
 
When you interviewed
with me, you were the one who said that you were looking for steady growth
within a solid company that would come to value you.
 
You were the one who said that you
wanted to finally be taken seriously.
 
You
told
me that you were tired of men getting promotions that
you knew you should have received, but likely hadn’t because you were a
woman.
 

“When you said
all of that to me, I listened to you because I remember those days myself.
 
I also knew that everything you wanted
to achieve in your professional life could happen for you right here at
Wenn—and that if you worked hard enough, you would realize your
goals.
 
But when Brock interrupted
our interview, I saw how both of you mooned over each other, I caught the
fireworks ricocheting off my office walls and slamming against the windows, and
I feared that if you did get involved with him, there was a good possibility
that you might underperform.”

“Have I?”

“Despite the
heat that apparently has been exploding between you two behind my back, you
haven’t.
 
With the exception of a
few blips, you’ve done an excellent job and, in the process, you’ve proved me
wrong when it comes to you getting involved with him.
 
But did I know that at the time?
 
Of course not.
 
I might be the tiniest bit older than
you, but I know for a fact that workplace affairs can send people off their
game, which I didn’t want to have happen to you because I saw so much potential
in you.
 
And then there was the
potential I knew that you saw in yourself.
 
During our interview, I asked if you had a boyfriend, and you said that
you were too focused on your career to even consider a boyfriend at this point
in your life.
 
In fact, you said a
boyfriend was out of the question.
 
And then Brock came along, and I knew that I needed to make a decision.”