I was sure I would have done the same thing in her place. Dream job that you’d worked your whole life to get? Nothing would stand in the way of keeping that job. I wouldn’t even let the love of Lucah get between me and my job. Well. I’d at least tried. Luckily, I’d gotten away with it.
“I understand,” I said, surprising both of us. I hadn’t meant to say it, but the words had a mind of their own. They wanted to be said.
“What?”
“It’s not your fault that those, for lack of a better term, ass**les, took advantage of you. I was aware of what they were trying to do, but I didn’t think they would stoop so low. I underestimated them.” Never again.
“I’m so, so sorry, Rory. I feel so awful about this whole thing and lying to you and everything. It was a really terrible thing to do. I totally understand if you hate me.”
“I don’t hate you. Honest. It could have just as easily have been me. I’ve worked my ass off to get where I am, but it definitely helps having your father be the president of the company you want to work for.” I hated, more than anything else, admitting that. Because it was what nearly everyone thought who met me and heard what I did for work.
“Oh. Wow. I was prepared for you to throw your drink in my face, or scream at me. Obviously, I underestimated you. So I’m sorry about that as well. I guess I have a lot to be sorry for.” She laughed a little without humor.
“Most of the things you’re saying sorry for are out of your control. If I’d been a nicer person, maybe you would have felt more comfortable coming to me about this sooner and we wouldn’t have had to go through this. So I’m sorry for not being nicer to you.” I didn’t need to say why I hadn’t been nice. Well, I didn’t want to. It was too junior high.
“This whole thing is so awkward. Do you think we could maybe move past it? Start over?” I could try. That was the best I could do. I would never be able to erase the fact that she had dated my boyfriend, but I could try to push past it and not let it stand between us becoming friends.
“When you first got hired, I was so happy because I thought I finally had a woman my age who wanted to go shoe shopping and didn’t care about golf. I am so sick of hearing about golf.”
“Oh my GOD, I know! I think some of them treat it as their religion and worship at the altar of Arnold Palmer.”
“They probably have altars in their homes that their wives don’t know about,” I added.
She put her hand over her heart. “I pledge allegiance, to the golf ball . . . “ For the first time since I’d met her, I lost myself in laughter with Violet. Of course she was funny. Lucah wouldn’t be attracted to anyone without a twisted sense of humor.
She laughed with me, and it was a cute, innocent sound. The barrier that had been put up between us when I’d found out that she and Lucah had been together cracked a little at the sound. It was still going to be there for a little while, and there would always be the memory of it, but if we could take it down a little, a piece at a time, we’d get somewhere.
The rest of our lunch was completely different than the beginning. Once we started talking about our shared hatred of golf, all sorts of conversational doors burst open wide, and we both ended up being late getting back to the office because we just couldn’t shut up.
We giggled as we rode the elevator up to our floor and got sharp glances from some of the other elevator riders, which only made us laugh harder. Being with Violet was like regressing to being a teenager again. Silly and giggly and completely unserious.
“Okay, well. I guess I’ll see you later, Miss Clarke,” she said with pretend formality.
“It was a lovely lunch, Miss Cooper. We shall have to do it again soon. Please let me know when you are free.” I sounded like I was trying to mock my mother. It was a good thing she wasn’t around.
We shook hands and tried not to laugh before she walked back down the hall to her office.
Lilia watched her go and then turned to me.
“That ended differently than it began,” she said, eyebrows higher than I’d ever seen them.
“You don’t know the half of it.” I decided not to tell Lilia about what Violet had revealed to me regarding the spying and so forth. It seemed like a violation of Violet’s trust, and I didn’t think she’d want me to tell anyone, even my assistant. So I wasn’t going to tell anyone, but Lucah, of course. And Dad. Je-sus Christ, I had to tell Dad.
In all my joy at my newfound friend, I’d completely forgotten about the shit the Board had pulled.
“I know you need to go to lunch, but can you wait, like, ten minutes? I have to go see Mr. Clarke about something and it’s kind of an emergency.”
“Yeah, no problem, of course. Go, go.” I dashed down the hall at a fast clip that wasn’t quite a run, but would get me there as quickly as possible. Mrs. Andrews wasn’t at her desk, so she was on probably lunch, which hopefully meant Dad wasn’t.
I knocked a few times and waited.
“Come in,” he said, and I took a breath before opening the door. I didn’t want to drop this bomb on him, but he needed to know.
“Rory! It’s nice to see you. Did you just come back from lunch?” He actually looked a little happier today. Great. I was going to stomp all over that in about five seconds.
“I just had lunch with Violet and she told me something you need to know.” His attention immediately narrowed and snapped on me.
I closed the door and sat down.
“She said the Board wanted to bribe her to become friends with me and then spy on me, and you by association.” He was silent for a moment, digesting my words. They didn’t appear to be going down easy.
“I thought as much. She’s not the first, and I don’t think she’ll be the last. This has got to stop,” he said, shaking his head.
“Why not have them arrested? I’m pretty sure they’ve broken a law or two.” Or twelve.
“That kind of thing is very hard to prove without recordings, or a paper trail, and they’ve been very careful to cover their tracks and never say anything outright that could incriminate them. They know the laws and how to walk along the edges and toe the line, but not cross it.” I had a whole string of words I wanted to scream, but they definitely weren’t appropriate in a work setting, or in front of my father.
“Well, I think I have her on my side now, so we don’t have to worry about Violet. Who else have they gotten to?” Dad just shook his head at that.