I throw my bag down and slump in my office chair. “He thought it was a date and stiffed me with the bill for a £150 bottle of wine.”
“Such an arsehole,” Cecily replies, “but I will happily take that off your hands.” She picks the bottle up out of my grip.
“Why did he think it was a date?” Pacha asks, his focus already half back on his computer.
Cecily shouts before I can, “Because she has a vagina and therefore is incapable of presenting a business proposal!”
Pacha looks at me, perplexed. “Really?”
I give him a look. “Are you shocked about the business proposal or the vagina?”
Pacha screws up his face and slides his over-ear headphones back on.
Cecily relaxes into her seat, handing me a coffee in a light purple Wyst-branded mug. “If you were a man that would have gone a lot differently.”
I rub my temples. “If I were a man, a lot of things would be different. Look at this.”
She peers at the Odericco Investments post on my phone screen.
Her eyes widen. “Are you going to apply? The deadline is midnight.”
“I have all the pitch decks ready.” I click through to the application portal and, as I start to type in my name, huff out a laugh, toggling over the different options on the prefix drop-down menu. “Maybe I should select ‘Mr.’ Cole just to makesure the entirety of Odericco Investments knows I’m not asking them on a date.”
“It would probably get their attention too,” Cecily surmises while picking at her manicure. “Everyone loves it when a man is championing women’s issues.”
Rolling my eyes, I say, “Especially massive companies like Odericco.”
Odericco Investments is a leading investment firm with offices all over the world. TechRumble is hosted at their annual Summit of Innovation. Rookies can only get in if they are competing in Odericco Investments’Hunger Games–esque, multi-round, knockout competition. Thousands of young companies enter every year, and there is first-, second-, and third-prize money, earning £500K, £250K, and £100K respectively, as well as the backing and guidance from Dominic Odericco himself. Dominic is notoriously cutthroat, but it’s serious cash. But even if you don’t win, just being there, receiving an invitation to get up on that stage and compete, puts you in front of big venture capitalists and investors who are there to discover the “next big thing” in the tech world. Opening doors I’ve been scratching at for two years.
As I watch the upload bar slide on my presentation, my phone dings with a LinkedIn message from Will. I click it, in the hopes it will be an apology for running out on the bill. Now that sleeping with me is off the table, maybe he’ll actually be interested in hearing about the investment opportunity.
One new message from William Salter.
I remember where I know you from.
My ears begin to ring as I freeze, immediately going to block him as another message pops up on my screen.
Guess I should have stayed ;)
And there it is.
The demon on my back. The specter that doesn’talwayspop up behind me in the bathroom mirror, but just often enough to make me flinch every time I look.
The sound of the telecom jolts me back into the room. Followed by my brother, Spencer, flying through the door like a car running a red light. I glance back at my phone, blocking Will’s account before he can send me anything else.
“Please don’t talk to me,” Spencer announces, throwing off his green angora check scarf and matching beanie hat. His dirty blond hair bounces in the air as his body drops down. “I’ve been up since 3 a.m., and I think my bones have transformed into icicles.” His face, still with a sheen of last night’s stage makeup, gleams in the fluorescent lights.
London is freezing. An out-of-context cold that should be enjoyed curled up in a cottage in front of a roaring fire, with a glass of red wine and a good book. Only occasionally looking out the window and commenting, “Maybe we could make snowmen before dinner,” as some sort of small furry cat or dog curls around your thick-socked feet. Instead, you are forced to battle royal for an inch of space on the Tube, as those who usually walk or cycle avoid spending a moment more than necessary outside with the bitter wind, murky slush, and 4 p.m. darkness. Like going from freezing to sweating to freezing ten times overin the world’s angriest Austrian spa before you’ve even made it to the office.
“So the shoot went well?” I ask with an arched brow.
He shakes off his layers of North Face padding and throws them onto his desk at the opposite side of the room. “I thought I was getting a featured role, but all I did was walk pensively from one side of the street to the other. Then, when we werefinallywrapping, a PA noticed one of the extras wearing his Apple Watch with his Elizabethan three-piece suit, so we had to all get back into costume and reshoot for another three very long hours.”
I cringe. “Nooo, did they get fired?”
He nods solemnly. “Shot on sight.”
“Any celebos?” Cecily asks, wide-eyed.
