My Devil In A Suit

CHAPTER 7

"I know this might sound strange, but I'm sorry for what happened yesterday."

My eyes lit up.

Is he possessed?

I ran out of his office in shock.

"Are you okay?" Natalie asked as I stumbled back into the bullpen.

"Yes, I am."

"Then why did you run out of Damien's office that way?"

"He apologized to me."

"What?"

"I swear he did."

"It's looking like the boss isn't feeling well," Natalie said, shaking her head.

"That must be the case."

"Hailee." Vanessa's sharp voice cut in from down the row. "Why would you cause such a commotion? You should have it at the back of your rotten mind that this is a corporate space."

"Oops! I didn't know that was part of the corporate policy."

"Watch your back, dear."

After I said that to her, I turned to walk away, leaving her looking like a fool. But as I turned, I saw my boss standing at the door frame with his hands in his pockets, his eyes glued to mine. When Vanessa noticed him, she walked up to gain his attention, but Damien Korrigan just turned and walked away.

This girl has gotten me into trouble again, I screamed in my head.

"Not good enough," I muttered, staring at my screen.

This was Damien Korrigan. He had rejected a whole report yesterday just because a single comma was out of place. If there was one mistake, he would find it.

"You're still on that?" Natalie whispered from the next desk, rolling her chair closer.

"He told me to redo it."

"He told you to redo it yesterday." She looked at my screen. "Hailee, this is already better than what most people in this office submit."

"Most people aren't on indefinite probation."

She had no answer for that, so she squeezed my shoulder and rolled back to her desk.

I got back to work. I rewrote the summary, fixed the numbers for the east wing, and rebuilt the timeline from memory because I had lost my first notes in my anger. By the time I typed the last period, my eyes were burning and my coffee had gone cold.

I hit print and held my breath.

The printer groaned, coughed, and jammed on the second page.

"No, no, no," I whispered, pulling the sheet out carefully. It tore at the corner. I printed it again, and this time the pages came out clean. I stacked them together, tapped them flat against my desk, and clipped them with a binder clip.

This time, it was perfect.

I saved the file, saved a copy, slid the printed report into a blue folder, and labeled the tab clearly in my neatest handwriting.

"Hailee." Koré stopped by my desk, her face completely blank. "Damien wants the redone report on his desk by closing."

"It's ready," I said, tapping the blue folder.

"Good." She didn't say anything else and walked off.

My throat went dry. I checked the wall clock. Three hours until closing. I needed a quick break, so I stepped away to the restroom to splash cold water on my face. The cold water helped calm my nerves, and for a brief minute, I thought the worst was behind me.

When I walked back into the main room, my stomach dropped.

My desk corner was bare. The blue folder was gone.

My heart started pounding. I dropped to my knees, searching the floor and looking under my chair. Nothing. I stood up and looked at Natalie, but her eyes darted down to her keyboard right away.

"Natalie," I said, my voice shaking. "Did you see my folder? The blue one?"

"I... I didn't see anything, Hailee," she said without looking up.

Panic hit me hard. I looked around the room, and then I thought of the copy room down the hall.

I rushed down the hallway and pushed the door open. Right away, I saw it. White and blue paper strips were spilling out of the bin under the paper shredder.

My breath stopped. I fell to my knees and pulled a handful of paper strips out of the bin.

There was my handwriting. There were the numbers for the east wing.

The whole report was completely shredded into tiny pieces.

My face went hot with anger. Everything clicked into place, and I remembered what Vanessa had said to me that morning: Watch your back, dear.

I stood up, shaking with rage, and walked straight back to the main room.

Vanessa was leaning against her desk, filing her nails. When she saw me, she didn't look surprised at all. She put the file down, gave me a broad smile, and opened her hands.

"I told you, dear," she said.