Temping is Hell

by Cathy Yardley

  “Fine.” He nodded at her. “Good night.”

  She took a deep breath. “I love you,” she said. It wasn’t particularly graceful, but she meant it.

  He sighed, weary. “Love you, too, Katie,” he said, then lumbered off toward the bedroom.

  She went to her own room, turning on the light. It had been her bedroom in junior high and high school. She’d moved out once she got into college, even though Berkeley was only twenty-five minutes away. But the bedroom still had traces of that adolescence. A poster of Lord of the Rings on the wall. Dog-eared paperbacks crammed haphazardly into a white bookshelf. A signed CD from some high school band. Framed pictures of her with her brother, Tim, when he graduated from the police academy.

  She still remembered when the family had moved here after the disaster in Southern California. The way they blamed her for needing to move back up here.

  In too many ways, this place had never really felt like home. Now, fourteen years after she’d moved out the first time, it felt like a time capsule of failure and shame.

  She had to get out. She’d pay rent. She’d take on a second job if she had to.

  And if it meant catering to a psychotic prom queen in one of the lowest rings of corporate hell, then so be it.

  Chapter Two

  At seven the next morning, Thomas sat at his new desk, in his new office on the top floor. The morning sky was still a pale salmon gray. Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, he had a view of Oakland’s Lake Merritt and the Bay Bridge beyond, with San Francisco’s skyline in the distance. The office itself was luxuriously appointed—he did, after all, have appearances to maintain. Everything screamed sophistication, money, and an almost sinful decadence.

  He could have been sitting in a cafeteria, for all he cared. His focus was entirely on the old man sitting in the red leather chair across from his desk.

  “When I brought you on board two years ago, Al,” Thomas said, his voice mild despite the anger simmering in his blood. “I frankly thought the process would be a lot further along by now.”

  The little man snorted derisively, the sound dry as old paper. “Talk to your consultant over there. It’s not my fault you didn’t have my home ready on time.”

  Thomas glanced over his shoulder at Yagi, his “consultant.” The guy looked like Yakuza—impeccably dressed in a three-piece pinstripe suit—yet that sense of badass Asian hovered around him.

  Of course, the Yakuza would probably pee their pants if they ever met a guy like Yagi.

  His face was placid, but Thomas had worked with the man long enough to recognize the irritation in his dark eyes.

  They’d both had enough of Al. Too damned bad they still needed him.

  “Building an internationally—and inter-dimensionally—acknowledged sanctuary is no simple feat, as you well know, Aloysius,” Yagi said, in his lightly accented English. “Neither is building a military-grade, and paranormally protected, fortress such as this headquarters. If you didn’t have such powerful enemies in the Underworld, the precautions might not have been necessary.”

  Al frowned, making the mass of wrinkles on his face shift like a Slinky. “Well, pulling soul contracts from Hell’s archives and ‘relocating’ fifty Ammonite demons isn’t exactly a picnic either, Kato.”

  Yagi didn’t respond, but Thomas bristled at the old man’s insolence. “You’re valuable. You’re not irreplaceable.”

  “Aren’t I?” Al’s responding look was smug. “You really want fifty demons on the loose in your pretty new headquarters?”

  Now Yagi took a step forward, his small smile lethal. “I feel confident I could return them to their homes fairly easily.”

  Al tried to stare down Yagi but blanched when Yagi didn’t blink. He shifted his focus back to Thomas, licking his lips nervously. “Yeah, but I’m the only one who can get more demons here if I need to. And they’re the only ones who can look through the contracts and find the signatories you need.”

  Thomas gritted his teeth. “So again… What’s the hold up?”

  “They’re Ammonite demons.”

  Thomas waited. “So?”

  Al rolled his eyes. “Ammonites are the lowest class of demons. They’re not affiliated with the hierarchy. They aren’t subject to any demon lords. That means that they’re rogues, running scared… or useless, and nobody wants ’em. They’re dregs.”

  “So why do we have them?” Thomas snapped.

  “Boy, do you really think you want a demon foot soldier in here? Or a spy?” Al snapped back. “Ammonites are runty and vicious, stupid and weak. But we’re not looking for fighters. We’re looking for…” He searched for a word. “Clerks.”

  “Can they read?” Yagi asked.

  “Enough.” Al shrugged. “Don’t worry about my end, shinobi. They know what to look for.”

  Thomas noticed that Yagi made the barest grimace when Al used the Japanese word—shinobi. It meant covert agent, mercenary.

  Apparently, it also meant ninja.

  Demon wranglers and ninjas. Thomas sighed, covering his eyes for a moment. Ever since he’d started handling his little soul contract predicament, his payroll had gotten weirder and weirder.

  “I need those names, Al,” Thomas repeated, feeling weary.

  “Don’t sweat it. The demons will get ’em.”

  “You don’t understand,” Thomas emphasized, his voice cold and hard as an Arctic ice floe. “I need them now.”

  Al huffed, but there was a little flicker of fear in his dust-gray eyes. “Like I said, they’re stupid. Lazy, too. They’re going as fast as they can.”

  “You’d better hope not.” Thomas rested his hands on the desk surface. “You’ve got one month.”

  Al looked startled. Then his expression turned crafty. “One month, or what? We’ve got a contract. You promised me a place to live in the Havens—and sanctuary—for as long as I’m working for you. And it’s not like there’s any other way you can find the names.”

  “One month, Al.” Thomas’s voice was quiet, and the mildness of his tone only underlined the deathly seriousness of his statement. “Or, not only will I kick you out of the Havens… I’ll make sure all your old employers know exactly where you are—and what you’ve been up to.”

  Al turned white, then purple. He scrambled to his feet, hanging onto his cane like a life preserver. “You c-can’t—” he spluttered.

  “Don’t fuck with me.” Thomas nodded at the door. “Just get the names.”

  With one last murderous glance, Al turned and hobbled out of the room.

  When the door closed, Yagi sighed. “We can’t trust him. You know that.”

  “You’re the one who hired him.” Thomas walked to his credenza and poured himself a cup of coffee. “I don’t have a lot of options, Yagi. I’m down to one year. Just one damned year to find all these guys and take care of them.”

  Yagi was silent for a moment. “Do you think you’re ready?”

  Thomas took a big sip of the coffee, scalding the roof of his mouth. Caffeine, he thought gratefully. “You’ve been training me for five years. You tell me.”

  “You’re ready physically,” Yagi admitted. “Considering you don’t have the powers most signatory bargain for, your reflexes and abilities are fairly impressive. But mentally… emotionally…”

  Thomas frowned. “What are you saying?”

  “You’re going to need to kill twelve people. Thirteen, including Cyril.” Yagi’s face was stern. “And more than that, you’re going to have to bend rules, break laws. You’ll need to do things you find repugnant, with people you find repulsive. If you aren’t willing to do that, you won’t be free. But once you take this path, you can’t go back. So I repeat: are you ready?”

  Thomas closed his eyes for a second. He pictured Elizabeth, the first time he’d met her, smiling quietly behind her desk, looking like Grace Kelly. Then later in their relationship, hanging on his arm, dazzling paparazzi in a stunning white dress.

  Then much later, writ
hing in agony in a hospital bed.

  Finally lying still, in a pool of blood.

  He grimaced, then forced himself to drink the rest of the coffee, putting the cup down before his hands shook.

  This wasn’t about getting free.

  This was about revenge.

  “I’m ready,” Thomas said, and his voice rasped slightly. “I will do whatever it takes to kill Cyril Roman.”

  Yagi nodded, a small smile of triumph hovering around his lips.

  “To start with,” Thomas added, turning back to his desk, “I think I may have figured out a way around Al.”

  …

  Kate walked into Fiendish at eight forty-five on the dot, feeling only a little draggy. To try and counter the slump, she’d indulged in a Venti pumpkin spice latte before she walked into Maggie’s office.

  “Good morning, Mag— I mean, Ms. Maggie. Did you get a chance to go over my notes?”

  Maggie didn’t even look up from her breakfast—an egg, bacon, and cheese laden bagel thing almost as big as her head—or her iPhone, from which the sounds of dying video game pigs wailed. How the woman remained that stick thin was a bit of a mystery, Kate thought with envy. Maggie finally swallowed, then registered Kate’s presence.

  “What are you doing here?”

  Kate figured she was kidding, but Maggie’s cool stare obviously wasn’t a joke. “I finished the personnel files you requested,” Kate said.

  “You didn’t do what I asked.”

  Kate froze. “Excuse me?”

  “I asked for a phone directory,” Maggie said with slow, condescending exaggeration. “And I don’t see anything on my desk that looks like a phone directory. So I’m a little surprised that you have the nerve to show up here at all.”

  With all the crap on your desk, how would you know?

  Kate gritted her teeth. “It’s electronic,” she returned in the same slow, insulting cadence. “It’s completely searchable—a true personnel database. If you’re going through annual reviews and need to assign raises, you’ll have everyone’s pay rate. If you need to get a password, it’ll be right there. Everything that’s on the questionnaire is included, so you can change one thing without filling in or crossing out anything.” She paused. “And you could print off a phone list.”

  “Yes, but is it what I asked you to do?” Maggie stood up, brushing crumbs off her skin-tight black suit. “I’m afraid I don’t tolerate incompetence.”

  “Incompetence?” Kate bristled, half in shock, half in fury.

  “Maggie?” Thomas stuck his head into the doorway, frowning. “Listen, I need one of the guys from I.T…. Oh. It’s you.” He shot Kate a small, surprised smile. “We meet again.”

  Kate blinked, some of her anger ebbing. Whatever else they might say about the guy, there was no question why Thomas Kestrel routinely led the Most Eligible Bachelor category in so many magazines. She didn’t have a thing for cowboys, but the combination of his drawl and his bright, intense blue eyes caused her stomach to do little flip-flops. She hadn’t had a reaction like this to any guy since she’d crushed hard on Matt Waller in junior high.

  Probably not the smartest reaction to have to a super-private billionaire playboy type who regularly dated supermodels and rock stars and such. But not exactly surprising, either, she consoled herself.

  “Hey, stranger. Staying out of trouble?” she said, then grinned when Maggie’s jaw dropped at the greeting.

  “Actually, I was going to scout out some fine a capella talent.” He winked. “If you were up for it, I thought I’d request some Celine Dion. Or maybe Ludacris. You seem versatile.”

  “Not much to sing about,” Kate said. “I’m getting fired.”

  “What?” Now he stepped fully into Maggie’s office. “Why?”

  “She mentioned you wanted a phone list of your direct reports in the main building—”

  “And she didn’t give it to me,” Maggie interrupted, quickly crossing the room and going to Thomas’s side. “Really, Thomas, this is nothing you need to concern yourself with. I’d already warned her—”

  “I created a database,” Kate interrupted right back, earning a blistering glare from Maggie. “I can print off a phone directory in about five minutes—or pull any information on an employee that you might need. It’s on a secured drive, and I’ve got a password for it. Which I put in my note, explaining all this,” she added, staring at Maggie pointedly.

  “She just up and decided what she wanted to do, instead of what I told her t-to do!” Maggie spluttered, her Southern accent more pronounced.

  Thomas was surveying Kate curiously. “That’s good work,” he said, his tone thoughtful. “God knows it’ll be useful when pay raises come up or if there’s an emergency.”

  Maggie choked but quickly got a hold of herself. “You don’t understand. I don’t think we want temps simply going off on their own,” she said with emphasis. “Doing whatever they want. Considering what we do, what we are… I simply don’t think that she fits in here!”

  “Funny, neither does she,” he murmured, and Kate felt her cheeks heat in embarrassment. “Still, as long as she’s willing to compromise and work with an evil empire like Fiendish, I get the feeling she might be an asset to the company.”

  “But Thomas…” For a second, Maggie dropped the pouty-cute-blonde act, and a flash of pure fury crossed her face.

  Kate abruptly remembered what Steffi had mentioned—something about Maggie’s relationship with Thomas. She felt uncomfortable, glancing at him. Why in the world would he be involved with this raging bitch?

  Of course, considering Maggie’s body, she imagined the answer was probably self-evident.

  His glance was stern, unbending as steel. “Mags—keep her on.”

  That shut Maggie up like a coffin. Kate forced herself to hide her grin.

  “Can I see this database?” he asked, glancing at Kate. “Maggie, can we use your computer?”

  Kate glanced at Maggie, who gestured to her monitor. When Kate turned it on, a blog about hot bachelors came up. A picture of Thomas with no shirt on took up the whole screen.

  “Oh, my,” Kate breathed.

  Maggie’s face turned an unattractive flame red, and she moved to her computer in a blink, shutting down the browser. Thomas’s expression remained blank as he moved to hover by Kate’s side.

  Kate swallowed hard, then opened up the database file, trying desperately not to superimpose the image of hello-hot-shirtless-guy on the man who glanced over her shoulder as she quickly pulled the names of I.T. employees in the building.

  “Perfect. Print that out for me, will you?”

  “Sure,” she said, turning as she did.

  He was maybe a few inches from her face. She swallowed again, as if that would help the sudden dryness in her mouth.

  Damn, he’s good looking.

  Thomas locked gazes with her, and for a second, her breath caught. She forced herself to shift focus back to the black-and-white boring data on the monitor.

  “This is good work,” Thomas repeated, stepping toward the printer and retrieving the names. “Mags, maybe we should turn her loose on something a bit more challenging and see how she works out. Okay?”

  Maggie nodded, trying to look both serious and like she didn’t just plaster a cheesecake shot of Thomas all over her computer. Which made Kate wonder if the rumors were true. If Maggie were sleeping with Thomas, why would she need the photo, right?

  Or maybe that was wishful thinking.

  “Good. Thanks.” He nodded to Kate, then Maggie, and left the office.

  Maggie waited until his footsteps disappeared down the hallway, then turned on Kate, her eyes blazing. “How does he know you?”

  Kate fought not to grin. “I was working late. He was leaving, saw the light, heard me singing. He stopped by.”

  “Well. Well.” Maggie held her coffee cup in a stranglehold, so tight the plastic lid popped off like a jack-in-the-box. “Damn it!”

  Guess I’m not
getting fired, Kate thought with a little burst of glee.

  She might not like working for big corporate, but damned if she was going to get canned by a petty, stupid, Angry Bird fiend with the metabolism of a hamster on crack.

  Then, like a switch turning off, Maggie’s look of undisguised hatred smoothed back into an approximation of her usual smug, cat-like smile.

  “So, he wants me to turn you loose on something more challenging,” Maggie drawled with a poisonous sweetness. “What sort of a challenge can I find for you?”

  Kate knew automatically what the new gleam in Maggie’s eyes meant. Kate had gotten the job, all right—and now, her jealous and paranoid manager was going to go out of her way to make Kate’s life a living hell.

  Wonderful, Kate thought. Just fan-fucking-tastic.

  Chapter Three

  It took a whole day for Maggie to figure out what Kate’s new assignment would be. Now, it seemed to take forever to get to basement level fifteen, the second lowest in the whole huge building and Kate’s new home for the next few weeks. Riding in the elevator reminded her of the one time she’d taken a trip with her family to the Carlsbad Caverns. There was the same feeling of pressure with hints of claustrophobia.

  When the doors opened, there was an absolutely huge room, dark and dismal, like a big prison common area. Everything was a stark gray. There were tables, she noted immediately, and then gaped at the stacks upon stacks of papers. Papers frickin’ everywhere.

  “So this is Contracts,” she muttered, already mentally cursing Maggie.

  Her spoken words drew attention. Once she looked past the papers, she saw men sitting on metal folding chairs, going through the documents. The men all looked similar… some ethnicity she couldn’t quite place. Slavic? Russian, maybe? Some Hispanic mix? Hell, all of the above? In the Bay Area, anything was possible.

  They also all looked like mixed martial arts fighters—huge, with no necks and bulging biceps.