The Brutal Truth

by Lee Winter

  “Mmm.” Perry ran a hand over his bald head and then glanced at the clock. It was nearing eight in the morning. “So, time starts now?”

  Maddie bit her lip. “Why not, ah, call it a draw, and we both walk away?”

  Studying her for a moment, Elena shook her head. “I knew it.” Her eyes were taunting. “No backbone whatsoever.”

  “Ooh.” Perry’s eyes widened. “I believe, Maddie Grey, you just got called a coward.”

  Maddie glared at them both, unable to believe what she was about to do. “Fine! Time starts now.”

  “And my day just got a whole lot more interesting.” Perry beamed. “Yours too, I imagine,” he told his boss.

  “We shall see.” Elena studied Maddie again, her expression now far too pleased to be safe.

  “Uh, I should get back to my desk,” Maddie croaked, sliding her pen onto her notebook.

  “Why?” Elena asked, tone silky. “And remember, honesty is the best policy.”

  “So you don’t ask me anything I don’t want to answer.” Maddie reddened. “And so I can’t see you looking at me like a steak you’re about to rip to shreds and feed to piranhas.”

  Perry gave a snort of laughter.

  “Perry,” Elena said, her voice dropping to a low tone, “leave. I believe my brutally honest assistant and I have some things to discuss.”

  Maddie gulped.

  CHAPTER 14

  The Brutal Truth

  Perry left, shooting Maddie a tell-me-everything-later look that she would have laughed at if things weren’t so serious. At that thought, she glanced back to her boss, who was watching her with a dangerous expression. All other thoughts fled.

  “Sit.” Elena leaned her elbows on her desk, steepling her fingers. “Any confessions before we start?”

  “Confessions?” Maddie hesitated. “If this is about last night…” She faded out, not exactly sure what she could add to an already catastrophic catastrophe.

  “Did anything useful come out of it?” Elena asked, eyes sharp. “Aside from assorted hickeys?”

  Maddie ignored the jibe. “I learned Natalii is really smart. Not easily fooled. And she and her mother clash a lot.”

  “Such as about whom her daughter kisses at three in the morning outside an infamous lesbian bar?” Elena’s tone dropped to cool.

  “How did you know it was four? That wasn’t in the news article.”

  Elena shifted a layout proof to the left. “I don’t see how that’s relevant.” She shifted it back to the right.

  “It is to me.” Maddie licked her lips. “How did you know?”

  Elena gave her a sour look. “Felicity found out.”

  “Why?”

  Maddie wondered if she’d pushed too hard when Elena’s expression darkened. There was a long silence.

  “I asked her for more information,” Elena said, voice tight. “Felicity contacted that odious photographer and asked for further details of the events from last night. Nothing more.” She waved her hand as though it was of little consequence.

  “But why?” Maddie asked again before she could stop herself. She bit her lip.

  Elena gave her the same acidic look she usually reserved for Emmanuelle Lecoq. “Why you kissed that Duchamp woman is a far better question.”

  “Not from my perspective,” Maddie whispered.

  “I can see you plan to take liberties with this bet. You know where the door is.”

  “What? That’s cheating! You…” She petered out under a glare so frosty it would have re-iced the polar caps.

  “Be very careful what you say to me next, Madeleine. I may have indulged this silly bet of yours, but I am still your employer. You are easily replaced. There are always others desperate to take your job. Never forget that.”

  Shock rocked through Maddie at the callous words. Easily replaced. How could she say that? Maddie had put up with a lot from her demanding boss since she’d become her PA, and she’d taken it because she remembered the other side of her, the things they never talked about. Shared moments, laughing or challenging each other in New York in the middle of the night, when they were alone. And while those moments were never far from her mind, much as she wished they were, she’d been the perfect assistant in Sydney. Maddie had made sure nothing of her real thoughts had ever glimmered through the cracks.

  Until now.

  As her anger rose, she allowed it to show at Elena’s heartless words. Telling Maddie she was nothing. That’s really what she’d said, wasn’t it? She’d just admitted Maddie didn’t matter. You are easily replaced. There are always others desperate to take your job. Did Elena even believe that? Maybe she did. She shook her head at Elena’s closed face and felt her teeth bare. “They wouldn’t be so desperate for it if they knew exactly what it entails.”

  Elena went still and stared at her. Every part of her expression radiated danger. “Oh?” So soft. “And what is it you think is so terribly onerous that an assistant of mine has to endure?”

  Common sense and self-preservation caught up with Maddie, who squelched down her anger. “No. You really don’t want to know.”

  “As it turns out, I do,” Elena said. “And leave no whimper of injustice or tragic complaint unaired. I’m sure this will be most enlightening.” She leaned back in her executive chair, studying her.

  “You don’t want to know the answer,” Maddie tried again. “Trust me.” She scrambled out of her chair and edged to the door. “I have some filing to do, calls to make…”

  “Stop. Sit. Proceed.” Elena pointed at the chair Maddie had just vacated. “You did agree to be honest with me.”

  Maddie froze. She just had to open her big mouth. Her anger had leaked and now, here she was, about to shatter Elena’s world. She swallowed. Then sat. And began.

  “Your PAs have to do the impossible,” she said, wondering if she could distract her with the smaller stuff. “That’s okay if we could actually also get five minutes for food. Trying to dodge city traffic with low blood sugar is…not fun.”

  She tried to smile, but Elena stared back at her stony-faced.

  “That’s it? How very terrible for you. Pack snacks. Harden up.”

  “We also get paid a crappy wage,” Maddie said, “and work hours that are so long it’s hard to remember what sunlight is some days.”

  “But you get invaluable experience,” Elena said with a curt tone. “You are seeing the world of publishing from the very highest levels and gaining insights that many at your age would never hope to. Your objections are ridiculous. When I started out, I worked seventy-hour weeks and never once complained. I stepped up and took advantage of the opportunity.”

  Maddie folded her arms. “Well, fine. But then there’s the harassment.”

  She had vowed never to share this secret, but Elena’s challenging, mocking look pressed all of her buttons. The shock on Elena’s face was almost worth it. At her stunned silence, a new, sinking feeling warred with Maddie’s anger.

  “What?” Elena’s tone was incredulous.

  Maddie forced herself to continue, her throat tightening at the thought of what was to come. “Some of your executives, associates, and friends act inappropriately around your PAs. They do it because they think we’re disposable. They’re right.”

  “Who?” Elena’s voice was barely audible.

  “Some big names try it on. We have been propositioned…”

  Elena snorted, and her shoulders relaxed. “Propositioned? Is that all? You can’t work out how to say no, so it’s all my fault? If you knew what it was like when I was starting out… My God, the things that—”

  “I haven’t finished!” When Elena’s jaw clamped shut, Maddie continued. “If it was just the endless come-ons, it’d be something your assistants could handle, but hands wander. A few do much worse. These men think they can grope your assistants, shove hands up our skirts, say disgusting things. The ones who are the worst of the worst and a serious threat to safety make the list.”

  “List?�
�

  “The assistants’ blacklist. It’s a list that all the previous assistants leave in the bottom of the drawer in a handbook, to warn the next PA. It’s a safety list. Any name on that list—we should never be alone with them, and never get cornered. Ever.”

  “I want the names on your little list.” Elena’s lips pressed firmly together as though she was trying not to say something else. Her eyes flashed and fixed on Maddie with a scary intensity.

  “Why? Would you really cut off world-famous photographers who helped put your magazine on the map to see justice done for your lowly assistants—some of whom weren’t with you for longer than a week? What about the sleazy board member? How could our feelings matter next to his importance to your company?”

  Elena hissed in a breath. “You…all of you thought that I wouldn’t care?” Hurt seared her face. “All of you involved in this conspiracy of silence thought I would have forgotten what it’s like to be a young woman in business? I dealt with misogyny every single day!” Her glare was furious.

  “Frankly, Elena, your assistants thought you wouldn’t want to be put in the position to have to choose. Based on the comments on the list, I get the impression most didn’t actually want to know which side you’d have picked if you’d been told. Others thought you knew and had turned a blind eye. More than a few feared being fired. Either way, they thought silence the safest option—they all know that, for you, Bartell Corp always comes first.”

  Elena’s gaze drilled into her. She looked about ready to fire an entire department, and Maddie hunched over. And she hadn’t revealed the worst of it. Not by any means.

  “Their names.” She stabbed her desk with her manicured index finger. “And there will be repercussions. I don’t care who these harassers are.”

  “But it’s not just names of people who work with you. A few others outside of Bartell Corp also see your assistants as easy targets, because everyone knows they don’t last long.”

  “I’m not going to ask again.”

  Maddie’s heart began to hammer. She wished she could say anything else but what she was about to utter.

  “The list.” Maddie exhaled. She could name them in her sleep as she was so hyperaware of them whenever they were in her orbit. “Jonathan Polden and David Pettigrew.” Two of Elena’s two most talented fashion photographers. Both men had won international awards. “Stanley Links.” One of her well-regarded, successful newspaper managers. She swallowed at the next name. “Frank Harkness.” Elena’s business mentor, who sat on the board. They often travelled together. His picture was on her desk, for God’s sake.

  She took in the paling face opposite her and balled her fingers into tight fists. There was no easy way to say this final name. “And…Richard Barclay.”

  The strangled cry at the mention of Elena’s husband made Maddie feel like the shittiest creature on earth. That feeling lasted all of two seconds.

  “How dare you!” Elena looked ready to slap Maddie. “Is this some sort of a sick joke?”

  “Elena?” Maddie gaped at her.

  “Get out!”

  “I’m only being honest,” she said, her tone beseeching. “When he drinks too much, when we have to drop something off at your place or at events, sometimes he tries to pin an assistant against the nearest wall and get his hands inside our…”

  “Disgusting lies!” The shout was so loud, the glass walls seemed to shudder. And Elena had never, in Maddie’s entire existence working for her, raised her voice like this. Not once.

  Felicity threw herself through the door from the outer room, her eyes blown wide, heaving breaths puffing out her cheeks.

  Maddie didn’t blame her. An earth-shattering cataclysm had to be afoot. Maddie shrank even farther against her chair.

  “Elena?” Felicity’s gaze darted back to Maddie with an accusing stare. “Everything okay in here?”

  Maddie looked down at her hands. They were shaking. This wasn’t how she’d expected today to go. At worst, she thought she might be confessing an inappropriate and hopeless crush. She’d figured she could brush off the humiliation, deal with a few gloating or pitying looks, and get back to work. But this… Hell. What had she done?

  Elena was ashen, as she pinned her attention on her chief of staff. “Felicity, to your knowledge, has my husband ever touched you or any assistant inappropriately?”

  Felicity’s face lost all colour, and she shot Maddie a glower that said shit, seriously?

  Maddie sighed. Felicity had the worst poker face, but her loyalty to Elena was complete. She had a terrible feeling about where this was going.

  “Well?” The rage was coming off Elena in waves. Clearly, someone—or many someones—was about two seconds away from being fired, and by now everyone on the floor knew it.

  “No, Elena, your husband has always been a perfect gentleman to everyone.” Felicity did not meet Maddie’s gaze. A small flush spidered its way up her neck.

  It was a lie so blatant that at any other time Maddie would have laughed. Instead, her stomach dropped into her shoes.

  Elena turned back to Maddie, rage etching her features. Her shaking voice was just above a whisper when she spoke: “You’re fired. Pack your things. Get out of my sight.”

  “What? I’m fired?” Outrage flooded her. “So that brutal truth you claim to love? I get it now.”

  Instead of answering, Elena swivelled her chair to face the window, showing her back to Maddie.

  Maddie squared her shoulders. “I see. Well, you’re a fraud. I can’t believe I thought you were…” She swallowed down the rest of the sentence.

  “Oh, don’t stop there,” a low, harsh voice whispered from behind the chair. “No need to censor on my account.”

  “Someone worth admiring.” Maddie couldn’t stop the hint of sadness tinging her anger, as she ground the words out. “Someone worth…” She didn’t say wanting. “You don’t want the truth and never did. You just like to win. Or was it that you just wanted me to lose?”

  “Felicity,” Elena said, her voice a murmur. “Remove my former personal assistant from my office. Make the necessary arrangements with HR for a new one. We’re done.”

  Those trademark words, normally delivered so casually, were vicious and cutting. The impact slammed into Maddie with the force of a pair of bullets.

  Maddie turned to see Felicity’s incredulous face. The chief of staff tilted her head pointedly to the door. Maddie left Elena’s office, shutting the glass door behind her. Her last sight of the formidable media mogul, the woman who made her traitorous heart clench, was the back of her austere, black executive chair.

  “Are you insane?” Felicity hissed the moment they were out of Elena’s earshot. “What on earth possessed you to tell her that? Why would you do that to her? What were you thinking!”

  “She demanded I tell her the truth, and I thought she meant it,” Maddie snapped. She sat at her desk and systematically went through her drawers, wrenching them open, pulling out her possessions. “That’s what I was thinking.”

  “Elena doesn’t want the truth.” Felicity looked at her as if she were a dense child. “She just thinks she does. So we all give her an edited version. What you did today was beyond stupid. How could you not know that?”

  “And what you did today was lower than low. How could you lie like that?”

  “Unlike you, I have a survival instinct,” Felicity said. “Unlike you, I want to have a job at the end of the day.”

  “At what price?” Maddie tossed her contact book into her bag. “Did this job take your morals in exchange for being in the inner circle of the almighty Elena Bartell?”

  “Don’t you get all high and mighty on me! You didn’t even know who Elena was a year ago. It’s only since you’ve worked for her that you realise how brilliant she is. How remarkable. And how famous.”

  “Don’t dodge the question.” Maddie stopped packing to study her colleague in dismay. A colleague she’d been starting to think of as a friend. “How do you
feel getting me fired by lying about her skeezy, handsy asshole of a husband? And don’t think I didn’t recognise your handwriting in the comments on the list. You know firsthand what he’s like.”

  “You got yourself fired, thank you very much,” Felicity said, not bothering to deny her charge.

  Maddie saw the shadow of uncertainty in her eyes. “I hope that’s a comfort when the next assistant complains about how she had to escape Gropey Richard.”

  “Please,” Felicity said with an indignant sniff, “stop guilting me with those big, sad eyes and grow up. It’s a scary world out there. We’re all just trying to keep our head above water. I can’t think of anyone who wouldn’t have done what I did just now.”

  “Then I pity you.”

  “Oh-so judgmental. Let’s see how moral you feel when you can’t make your damned rent!”

  “At least I’ll still be able to look at myself in the mirror.” Maddie hefted her bag to her shoulder. She looked around. She had everything she wanted. Her gaze went to the silent office adjacent. Well, more or less.

  “In this city, you’d be lucky to even afford the mirror.”

  Maddie’s attention snapped back to Felicity. They regarded each other for a long moment.

  “What you did today, I’ll never forget,” Maddie said, steel edging her voice. She gentled her tone. “But I’ll probably miss you, strange as it may seem.”

  Felicity bit her lip and looked down. “Yes, well. You always were the odd one.” Her inflection lacked its customary bite. “And for God’s sake, Maddie, it wasn’t personal. At least believe that.”

  Maddie gave her head a rueful shake. “I know. I almost wish it was. At least then you’d have had the courage of your convictions.”

  Felicity’s shoulders lost their trademark rigidness and slumped, as Maddie left Bartell Corporation forever. Along with Elena.

  CHAPTER 15

  Grey’s Anatomy

  Elena leaned back in her chair and stared out the window. Her office was in the garment district of Sydney, and her three-storey red-brick building was among those where the piecework operations for the rag trade had dominated in the mid-1800s. Grey, concrete alleys scribbled through the suburb, and old, leafy Moreton Bay figs punched the sky.