A Silver Lining Read online

‘Oh my God,’ she said. ‘How did this happen?’

  ‘It was leaked last night,’ said Greg. ‘We don’t know how or why, nobody in the team will admit responsibility and Calvin wasn’t actually given the hard copy yet. He was all set on having a big reveal when Tim got back. So it was unlikely to be him. What we do know is it got picked up by a high profile blog in the States at some time in the early morning our time and the whole thing kind of snowballed from there!’

  Mollie had no idea why Greg found the whole thing so amusing. When Calvin found out he would go ballistic. A quick scan of the comments showed that the whole thing was being regarded as a comedic joke by those who watched it.

  She opened another tab and typed ‘Empressario video’ into the address bar. A number of hits from blogs came up and a national newspaper was calling it an internet sensation.

  ‘Calvin is not going to be impressed with this,’ said Mollie. It might have been his vision and it might have been his idea but Mollie knew that this type of coverage was not what he wanted. A lot of the You Tube comments were comparing him with Michael Scott from The Office. Calvin had quite the ego: he’d clearly believed that the video would portray him as a savvy businessman at the top of his game and in touch with the needs of his younger customers. Unfortunately, while he might be an investment genius, his powers of delusion seemed to be just as strong. This video made him look ridiculous, and there was no way on earth he was going to be happy with it.

  She took a deep swig of her coffee and reluctantly powered on her mobile. That was one of the biggest problems about being the boss – ultimately it was you who was responsible for liaising with the pissed-off customers.

  After a terse conversation with Calvin, Mollie hung up the phone. She flopped down on the couch with Greg, who was still going through the comments snickering loudly.

  ‘I don’t know why you’re laughing,’ she complained. ‘The video is ridiculous. The only thing this leak has established is bringing the end of my company around more quickly. Do you really expect me to be happy about that?’

  ‘If you’re going to fail, best to fail humorously,’ said Greg.

  ‘Yes but that also involves failing very, very, publicly.’

  ‘Well, your aim for the company was that it would make a name for itself,’ he pointed out. ‘From that point of view, the Empressario contract was a rousing success.’

  ‘Oh come on,’ she said. ‘You know how this kind of stuff goes around workplaces like wildfire,’ she said. ‘I knew this video wouldn’t exactly show me in a good light, but I thought that it would fly under the radar a certain amount. Now every single person I know is going to hear about this.’

  Greg shrugged. ‘Well, it’s done now.’

  Greg seemed to be enjoying this a little too much. Mollie sat up straight. ‘Wait…you didn’t leak it, did you?’

  ‘Hey!’ Greg said, looking hurt. ‘I may think it’s amusing, but I’m making the best of a bad situation. I wouldn’t just torpedo the company for my own amusement. I’m going to be out of a job too, you know.’

  Mollie felt a dart of shame. She wasn’t the only one in a bad situation as a result of this. ‘You’re right, I’m sorry.’

  ‘It’s ok,’ said Greg amicably. ‘Now do you want to see the dance remix or not?’

  ‘I…’ Mollie trailed off. Greg looked at her.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I know who leaked it,’ she said slowly. ‘And I’m going to kill him.’

  Giving a copy of the product to her ex-boyfriend probably wasn’t the brightest idea she’d ever had, but she hadn’t seriously thought that he would do anything with it. Yeah, they’d broken up in an odd way, but their split was hardly the stuff of revenge films. Maybe he’d been more cut up than she’d realised.

  Anyway, he wasn’t going to get away with it. He’d humiliated her publicly once before: she was damned if he was going to get away with it again.

  She took the bus to Empressario Corp. Parking spots in the city centre were like gold dust, and she couldn’t rule out needing some vodka after she saw him. A quick glance at her watch disabused her of that notion. It wasn’t even twelve o clock: unless she wanted to be known as a drunk as well as incompetent, then she’d have to hold off. She’d have loved to get a taxi, but looming unemployment meant she couldn’t face hiring one of the city’s extortionately priced taxis.

  She strode into the foyer of Empressario only to run straight into Calvin. Fuck.

  He strode over to her, and she braced herself for the diatribe that was coming.

  ‘Mollie,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t look like your little video is doing us a lot of good.’

  ‘I…’

  ‘No. You should have stuck with the brief that Tim told you to follow. I told you that we were looking for something much more conservative. I don’t think you really have a feeling for the demographic of the average Empressario customer.’

  ‘But it was your – ‘she protested.

  He placed a hand up to silence her. ‘Not to worry, we all have to start somewhere. Obviously we won’t be using your services again, but we will be paying your fee in full. Good day.’

  He walked away from her, and Mollie wanted to scream insults at his retreating back. How dare he blame these things on her! She’d drawn up a treatment for a crisp professional product and he had decided that he wanted to go for something ludicrous. How was that her fault? But Empressario had a formidable looking doorman, if she started shouting at one of the top guys she’d be unceremoniously ejected in ten seconds flat. Plus, she needed that payment. No, there was someone else she wanted to shout at.

  She walked over to the receptionist who was giving her a sympathetic smile. ‘He’s always like that,’ she said conspiratorially. ‘Don’t worry about it.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Mollie. ‘I left some equipment in the boardroom upstairs, I’m just going to head up and get it, ok?’

  There was a moment of hesitation. Strictly speaking, guests had to be accompanied by a member of staff at all times.

  ‘Please?’ she asked. ‘I’m just so humiliated by this whole thing; I want to collect my things quietly.’

  Luckily, the receptionist was the sympathetic type. ‘Go on up. But don’t be long.’

  Mollie flashed her a genuine smile. ‘Thanks so much.’

  She was in.

  The problem was that she didn’t know exactly where James worked. Every time she’d encountered him it had been in a communal area, one of the boardrooms, the corridors, the foyer. She’d been around for much of the week, so she didn’t encounter much resistance as she walked around. It was a fairly big office, so not everyone knew that she was part of the documentary team that had lampooned their company. She walked around with confidence, hoping that her serious businesswoman gait would fool people into thinking that she knew what she was doing. But there was only so long that she could loop around the office building before she attracted attention. She wished she’d kept his phone number, but she’d deleted it to stop herself caving and ringing him in the aftermath of their break-up.

  Think, she told herself. What part of the building would he work in? When they’d worked together before it had been a creative company, about as similar to Empressario as butter was to violins. It was hard to imagine James in a company that didn’t involve some degree of creativity. But did investment firms even have anything resembling a creative side? She was pretty sure that creative investment was pretty much fraud.

  A glance at her watch showed that she’d been looping around the building for the past ten minutes. She didn’t have much time before she was discovered.

  She walked over to the water cooler to bide her time.

  ‘Hi,’ a female voice said behind her. Mollie turned around and found herself face to face with Victoria, Calvin’s mercurial assistant. ‘What are you doing here?’ Her voice held no warmth.

  ‘I needed to collect something,’ said Mollie, sticking to her original line. Victoria moved her eyes sl
owly over her body, lingering pointedly on her empty hands.

  Damn. It was a good thing she hadn’t opted for a career in covert intelligence – she’d most likely be dead by now.

  ‘What exactly do you need to collect?’ asked Victoria. Her tone was light and helpful, as if she really cared about helping her find whatever it was she needed to find, but her eyes were hard. Mollie had felt sympathy for Victoria before now for having to work with such a mental man, but now she saw that Victoria was just as power crazy as her boss.

  ‘I need to collect something from the boardroom. A piece of equipment that we left behind’ said Mollie, her brain trying to frantically think of something that she could have forgotten.

  ‘You didn’t leave anything behind in the boardroom,’ said Victoria coldly. ‘We had a business breakfast in there this morning, we would have seen anything amiss.’

  Victoria’s hair was immaculately coiffed, and her suit was stiffly pressed. Mollie was sure that any item out of place in the boardroom would be identified and swiftly eliminated. Just like Mollie would be if she didn’t think of something fast.

  Mollie had a flash of inspiration. ‘Ok, well I guess we got that wrong then. I’ll just collect the release form from James Behan and I’ll be done here.’

  ‘A release form?’ Victoria scoffed. ‘Isn’t that a bit redundant after the fact? I mean, over a million people have already seen the video.’

  ‘He signed it before hand,’ said Mollie in what she hoped was a confident, level voice. ‘He forgot to give it to me though, and it’s imperative from a legal point of view that my company has all the necessary paperwork for the project.’

  Mollie could tell that the woman didn’t believe her, but she didn’t know enough about the workings of a filming team to contradict her.

  ‘Be quick,’ said Victoria. ‘We need you out of here in ten minutes. Security don’t like unaccompanied outsiders wandering around the building.’

  Victoria must have seen her on the security cameras or something, but the last thing she wanted was an audience for her conversation with James.

  ‘Believe me, I’ve better things to be doing with my day than walking the halls of Empressario,’ she said. ‘In fact, I’ve a business meeting across town in less than an hour so I’d like to get this sorted as soon as possible. If you just tell me where James works then I’ll be out of your hair.’

  Fifth floor, left side open office,’ said Victoria. ‘You’ll be able to take it from there?’

  ‘I’m sure I’ll manage,’ said Mollie. Victoria gave her a disbelieving look and stalked off in the other direction.

  Mollie took the elevator up to the fifth floor and walked over to the point Victoria had mentioned. There was a sea of open cubicles, and Mollie walked through them until she came to his desk. The sight of him brought her up short. Hunched over his desk with his shirt sleeves rolled up and a telephone receiver balanced between his shoulder and his chin he looked adorable. He was smiling into the phone, laughing at something the other person had said. Glenda maybe? The thought hardened her resolve and she walked over and tapped him on the shoulder. His turned around in his chair, his eyes lighting up for a second when he saw her, before being replaced by wariness when he registered her expression.

  ‘I’m going to have to call you back,’ he said firmly into the phone and hung up.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ asked James. ‘I’m surprised security let you through.’

  ‘It wasn’t easy,’ said Mollie. ‘I need to talk to you.’

  ‘Ok, how about the cafeteria?’

  Mollie shook her head. ‘I have…’ she glanced at her watch. ‘Four minutes and 52 seconds before I am unceremoniously ejected from the building on Victoria’s command.’

  ‘Cool, coffee shop across the street?’ he suggested. He was taking this whole thing very casually. He didn’t even seem perturbed by her frosty tone. Maybe she should practice it more.

  ‘Fine,’ she said.

  ‘Great,’ he said. ‘I could do with the caffeine fix.’ She didn’t need to tell him that there was little chance of them sharing a beverage together and reminiscing about old times. Shouting at him in the street was more what Mollie had in mind, even though it was a little tacky and had more place in a movie than in everyday life. But inviting people out to be bollocked didn’t really appeal to people. She supposed – reluctantly – that she had better act civil until she’d gotten him outside into neutral territory. Otherwise, she’d need to stand guard outside his office block come closing time and ambush him, which would be a complete and utter waste of her time. Not to mention the fact that he could sneak out the back way.

  Mollie had by now pretty much established that she had little in the way of sleuthing skills, so she flashed him a smile to hurry him on. Some of her underlying emotions must have seeped through though, because he shot her a concerned look.

  ‘Are you ok?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Are you sure? Because you look like you have wind.’

  She shot him a withering look and mercifully he didn’t say anything until they were in the foyer. They walked past Victoria, who was standing there barking orders at another employee. Mollie smiled and wiggled her fingers in a valedictory wave, but earned nothing but a scowl in return.

  ‘What did you say to her to make her dislike you so much?’ said James in awe as they went out onto the street. ‘I mean, you were only there a week, what could you have done to make her that mad?’

  Mollie said nothing.

  ‘I wish I could get away with doing whatever you did,’ said James. ‘She’s a right pain in the ass to work with.’

  ‘Well, technically you did.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You did the thing that got her in such an almighty funk.’

  ‘I don’t understand?’ James said in a confused voice.

  ‘She’s annoyed at me for purportedly leaking the tape.’

  ‘Ah,’ said James. He looked at her serious face. ‘Wait, you’re not angry about that, are you?’

  ‘Why on earth would you think that I wouldn’t be angry with that?’ she asked. ‘You knew I was upset about it, did you really think that I’d thank you for broadcasting the fact that my company came up with this madness? Nobody will go near us again!’ Her voice had risen a couple of octaves and people walking past were starting to stare.

  James grabbed her arm, but she pulled it away.

  ‘Look,’ he said, his voice warm and gentle. It still had the choclate-like depth she used to love so much when they were together. The sunlight reflecting off his blonde hair made her remember mornings of tangled limbs, cotton sheets, and sunlight coming through the Venetian blinds in her flat. ‘There’s a quiet café across the road where we can talk. I can explain everything.’

  ‘Yeah, you can’t explain your way out of everything, James,’ she said. This was familiar territory. He’d be the more level-headed of the two of them, she was more temperamental. James was good at calming people down and reasoning his way out of everything so you came to see his side. She’d loved the logical side to him, but his ability to talk his way out of anything had been infuriating. It was the primary reason that she’d changed her number after they split up. She’d had enough of being humiliated; she didn’t need him inveigling his way back into her affections.

  Nevertheless, being gawked at like they were live theatre wasn’t exactly her cup of tea either.

  ‘Fine,’ she said. She’d stick to monosyllabic until they got inside. Less chance of him managing to take something she said and using it against her.

  ‘I honestly thought that I was helping you,’ said James as soon as they were alone.

  ‘Helping me?’ said Mollie incredulously. ‘Helping me do what exactly?’

  ‘I thought,’ said James. ‘Well, I saw you in that boardroom. You had a really crisp professional idea, and Calvin wouldn’t have any of it.’

  Mollie crossed her arms across her chest. This w
as vintage James. Disarming you with flattery. She needed to be careful here, or she’d never get the real reason behind what he’d done.

  ‘I knew that the video was going to be a catastrophe,’ he continued. ‘I mean, there was no way it couldn’t be considering the changes he’d demanded. I felt bad for you, because it was going to damage you, no matter how good a job you did of keeping Calvin happy.’

  ‘Still,’ he continued. ‘I wasn’t worried about you that much – ‘

  ‘Gee, thanks,’ she said sarcastically.

  He continued as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘I wasn’t worried about you that much because I presumed that your business was pretty solvent. We all have crazy clients who, despite all our good advice, want to go in a crazy direction. But we keep them quiet. It wasn’t until I talked to you in the lift that day that I realised that you were hoping that this contract would sort of launch your company.’

  ‘It’s hard to set a company up from scratch these days,’ she said defensively. Even after all that had gone on between them she still wanted him to think well of her.

  ‘I know,’ he said. ‘Hey, it’s hard starting a business in a healthy economy. But I knew that this was going to torpedo your plans. So I was thinking, why not try and help you out? If we could turn a negative into a positive then everything would be fine.’

  ‘Excuse me if I fail to see how utter humiliation is ‘turning a negative into a positive,’ she said sarcastically. ‘I see working for a big business has enhanced your spinning skills.’

  ‘Yeah, the company are annoyed that one of their most senior employees is trending on twitter as one of the most ridiculous men of the moment. I knew they would be. I work in PR…’

  ‘Wait, Calvin works in PR?’ said Mollie incredulously. It was hard to imagine how someone so inept could work in such a sensitive job area.

  ‘No, I’m the PR rep on his team. My job is to manage the press that the company gets. I knew how the company was going to spin this because I was the one who was going to come up with the strategy.’

  ‘And how have you decided to play it?’ asked Mollie.