A Marriage of Inconvenience

Who Is He

We find a seat quickly at a little sandwich shop facing the window so that I can look out at the man that followed us. The fact that somebody followed us all of the way from the office out to lunch is more disconcerting than I would like to admit. From now on I am going to have to make sure that I keep an eye on who is behind me.

When the waitress comes over to take our orders I hardly pay attention to exactly what I am ordering. My main focus is outside at the person that is very openly sitting in his vehicle watching us. It is a nicer vehicle than I would expect from somebody that my family would hire and I am not sure about any friends that I left behind when I married Carl.

That brings me right back to Carl though. I know that he definitely has the means to have somebody follow me. He is practically made of money and always has been. If he were curious enough about me then it is entirely possible that he paid somebody to gather all of the information on me that he could.

"Are you o kay? How freaked out are you about the man out there?" Sadie asks me worriedly.

"The problem is that I do not know if I should be freaked out or not yet. It seems most likely that it is somebody that Carl paid to follow me but to what end? How long am I supposed to keep watching my back and wondering if somebody is following me? I mean, we both know that I have a secret that I absolutely do not want getting back." I say.

"We are just going to have to make sure that your life comes across as perfectly boring with nothing to report back then." She says with a conspiratorial smile.

"Do you have anybody that you know of that can look into the guy that is following me?" I ask her.

"Of course I do. I also have somebody that will make sure that he only gets information that we want him to get." She winks at me.

Immediately, I begin to relax as she shoots off a few text messages before our food arrives. I end up eating with much more enthusiasm than what I put into ordering it now that we have the beginnings of a plan. Or, maybe just the idea of the beginnings of a plan but either way it is still a start. It is still more than we had when we arrived.

"How are you enjoying your first day of work?" Sadie asks me on our drive back.

Thankfully, she distracts me from watching the man that is blatantly following us by the question. I have been watching him ever since we got back into the car. He does not even bother hiding the fact that he is following us. Is that some kind of message that he or Carl are trying to send?

"It is a lot more than I had imagined. I did not realize that there would be this much paperwork." I admit.

"Well, I do have to tell you that there is not ALWAYS this much paperwork. There is a little extra today so that you can get a good feel for the job. We wanted to make sure that you had a full overview of operations so that you know what is going on." She shrugs.

"That is a huge relief. I was afraid that I was just going to sit behind that desk all day everyday." I say.

"Once we get the paperwork there done I will take you to some of the other businesses that we partner with to formally introduce you. I have been fielding calls all day with queries about the new CEO that came out of nowhere." She tells me.

"Schedule the first couple for tomorrow. I will get all of this paperwork done today. Even if I have to stay all night." I promise her.

She tries to talk me out of pushing myself too much tonight but eventually she relents. Maybe she realizes that the work is partially to distract me from everything that is going on. There are way too many changes all at once and it feels like I am about to get whiplash from them all. I thought that I was handling everything okay until we noticed the guy following us. This might just be the final straw before a mental break but I am hoping to avoid that.

Luckily, I do not end up having to work all night to get through the paperwork. With the knowledge that this job is more than just papers I am able to find the motivation to work more quickly for the rest of the afternoon. By the time it is time for dinner I have placed the last papers down and stand up to go and meet with Sadie.

Even though I might have finished my work earlier than expected, most of the other employees have already finished up and left for the day. Sadie and I are the only ones left and she is in the middle of a phone call when I walk into her office. She glances up with a smile before holding a finger up to motion me to wait for just a moment as she continues her conversation.

It seems like the conversation she is having is mostly one sided as she is not contributing much but is listening intently. Every once in a while I hear a small comment to keep the conversation rolling but not enough to have any idea what the phone call is about. Just as I begin to settle in and get more comfortable she thanks the other person before hanging up the phone and smiling at me.

"That was the guy that we hired to dig up information on who is following you. Let's go and get dinner so that we can talk about all of this." She tells me.