Unfinished Muse (27 page)

I let out a rush of air. “Oh, gosh, no. I
already…I mean. No. Not someone I’m interested in.”

The second eyebrow jumped up with the first.
“An ex. Ah. So, let me get this straight. You think you saw your ex
somewhere and want to know for sure if he’s here? Is that
right?”

“No!” I frowned. “Yes. That’s exactly right.
And I think he may know I’m here and he’s been screwing with me. Or
I’m paranoid and delusional. And if that’s it, I’d kind of like to
know that, too.”

Patrice nodded. “Men are idiots.” She tapped
something on a tablet and it came to life. “What’s his name?”

“Freddy Mossman.” I shifted my weight from
foot to foot. Now that I wasn’t so nervous about Patrice—okay,
still nervous but no longer terrified—my anxiety shifted to what
Patrice may or may not find.

“Mossman.” She scrolled through the list on
her screen. “Arnold, Carl, Cathrine, Erika, Fredrick, Harold. Hmm.
You said Freddy?”

The sweat on my skin grew cold. “Yeah. You
said Frederick.”

“Could be him. Maybe you’re not delusional.”
Her snakes curled around her head and settled into a new style. It
was flattering—kind of like a casual updo.

“Only one way to find out, I guess. Can you
tell me where he works?”

She tapped on the screen and a new page came
up. “Dreams and Nightmares. Fourth floor.”

I nearly choked. “Really?”

She nodded. “Mean something to you?”

“Maybe. It makes sense. Now, I think I know
who’s been helping him.”

She backed out of the screen and set the
tablet aside. “I guess you’ve got your work cut out for you,
then.”

“I guess I do. Thanks, Patrice.”

She smiled. “Good luck.” She shifted her
attention before I stepped away. “Next!”

I went to the elevator fuming. Freddy had
been here the whole time, and he’d been working in the same
department as Rick. I stabbed at the button inside the elevator for
my floor. All that time, Rick had been playing me. And to what end?
So Freddy could…

The final piece slid into place and I nearly
choked on it. Freddy. Rick. Fredrick. Fred. Rick.

“I am a total moron.”

A harpy—the only other person in the
elevator—shook her feathers. “Did you say something?”

I shook my head. “Nothing. Sorry. Just
talking to myself.” The doors slid open on my floor and I stepped
out.

“First sign you’re delusional.” She smiled
at me as the door slid shut.

I shivered. Nope. I knew I wasn’t
delusional. I still didn’t know all the hows and whys of what the
hell Freddy/Rick was up to, but I was going to find out.

When I entered my office, the atmosphere was
similar to the previous Friday. In an office where I rarely saw
anyone, people were clustered in groups everywhere, whispering and
looking worried. Dave and Jeremy actually stepped out of my way as
I passed them to get to my desk.

The air was thick with murmurs from every
corner.

I set my purse on my desk and pulled out a
small decorative candy dish I’d brought back from a short time I
spent living in Albuquerque. The bottom of the dish was painted in
bright colors and featured a hot air balloon. I dropped the hair
clips and old gum into it and set it next to my keyboard.

Little by little, I was moving in.

As I adjusted the position of the dish,
someone behind me tapped on my shoulder. I turned to find Audrey
looking at me with uncharacteristic emotion. What emotion it was, I
couldn’t tell. But it wasn’t a sneer on her face. More like guilt
or as if she’d swallowed a bug.

“Can I talk to you for a minute?”

I folded my arms and leaned against the
desk. “Sure. What’s going on today? Everybody’s all agitated
again.”

She glanced away, not meeting my eyes. “I
need to apologize to you.”

I wrinkled my forehead. “Oh?”

I wasn’t sure what else to say. “It’s okay,
some people are just naturally bitches” probably wasn’t the way to
go.

Audrey rubbed her palms over her skirt, as
if her hands were sweating. “I’m sure you don’t know about this,
but your predecessor was my friend.”

“Phoebe.” I dropped her friend’s name, and
it lay between us like a rock.

Her eyes widened in surprise. “Okay. Maybe
you do know. Well, I blamed you for getting her fired, then taking
the job opening she left. I’m afraid I wasn’t a very good trainer
as a result. Then you were so nice to Trina when she got booted.
You didn’t report Dave to HR, even though he’s been a pig. And I’ve
watched how determined you’ve been, even working extra hours. I
feel terrible.”

I sighed. “I figured most of the job out
eventually. Don’t worry about it.”

“I wasn’t very nice. And I made everyone
else ignore you. I hoped…”

“That I’d quit?”

She nodded. “Maybe.”

I chuckled. “Look. I’ve recently figured out
that I’m not the best at being friendly myself. No harm done.”

She relaxed a little. “I figured, once you
read your handbook, you wouldn’t really need me for much, anyway.
It’s all there. But I’m sorry for isolating you.”

I frowned. “What handbook?”

She froze. “You can’t be serious. You didn’t
read the handbook?”

“I didn’t get a handbook. I got paperwork,
and you threw out most of the stuff that came with it. What was
leftover was hardly worth looking at. Did I miss something?”

She gave me a gentle push to get at my
computer. “It’s on your desktop. You can’t miss it. It says Muse
Handbook. Sheesh.”

My stomach churned. How could I have missed
something so important? I hadn’t used the computer for
much—research and mapping—but I’d totally missed the handbook.

“Well, that’s weird.” She stood over my
monitor, her expression puzzled.

“What’s weird?” I leaned closer. The little
icons lined up neatly on the desktop. There weren’t very many of
them. I didn’t see the one she’d been referring to.

“It’s not here. How can it not be here?” She
clicked through several folders and they all came up empty. As a
last try, she clicked on the trashcan icon.

And there it was—
Muse Handbook
in
large, clear letters.

“Why is it in the trash?” I honestly
couldn’t understand what was going on.

“I’m assuming you didn’t throw it away.” She
looked up at me for confirmation.

“I’ve never even seen it.”

“Well, despite my poor behavior, I never
would have tried to sabotage you like this. Breaking some of these
rules can be serious. You need to tell Polly about this. It might
change her mind.”

“Change her mind about what?”

Audrey straightened and turned toward me.
“Polly wants to see you. She sent me to get you. She looked pretty
upset.”

I sucked in a long breath. “Well, crap. So,
that’s what everybody’s talking about?”

She nodded. Her expression was filled with
compassion. “I’m afraid so.”

I lifted my chin. “Okay, then. I’m going in.
There’s a lot more going on here than you know.”

“I’m so sorry, Wynter. I never would have
screwed with you if I’d known.” She paused and her voice dropped to
almost a whisper. “Who did you piss off?”

I sighed. “I have my suspicions, but I don’t
know for sure yet.” I pulled my shoulders back and left her
standing there, wringing her hands.

Polly’s door was wide open. I didn’t even
have a chance to knock before her melodious voice greeted me from
deep inside.

“Come in, Wynter. Close the door and sit
down.” The voice was still melodic, but it sounded more like a
funeral dirge than an aria.

I sat in the chair opposite her and placed
my hands in my lap so she couldn’t see them shaking. I still wasn’t
sure what I’d done wrong. I knew a lot had been done
to me
,
though, so I was prepared for a fight. “You wanted to see me?”

She rubbed her fingertips over a tiny spot
between her thick eyebrows. “Please tell me it’s not true that
you’ve been speaking with your clients in full-flesh mode.”

My stomach tightened. “Full-flesh mode?”

“Visible. Solid. Out in the open.” She gave
me a pinched look, as if she would be angrier if she weren’t so
tired. “Don’t make this more difficult than it already is.
Please.”

I took a deep breath and let it out. “Okay.
Yes. I’ve been working with my clients in person. But there are
circumstances you don’t know about.”

“Wynter, you broke the cardinal rule.” She
shook her head and pushed a sheet of paper toward me. “What’s more,
you’ve been observed breaking several rules. Really important
ones.”

I took the paper from her desk and read it.
“Turned off invisibility belt while alone in a client’s home.” I
thought about it. “Yeah. Okay. I hadn’t learned how to interact
with objects very well, and I needed to see his notes. He didn’t
catch me.” How the hell did they know about that? “Since my
paperwork failed to tell me what the project was, I had to get
creative.”

Polly frowned. “That’s odd. But go on.”

I consulted the list. “Interacted with
clients while corporeal. Yeah. I had to undo the sabotage someone
else had been doing.” Looking at the list, I felt my blood pressure
rising as I grew angrier. “Took home belt and supplies without
proper authorization.” I looked up from the list, scowling. “First
of all, one of my clients is my next-door neighbor, and I wasn’t
about to drive all the way back to work at the end of the day to
put it back when I was already home. Second, I had no idea it
wasn’t allowed until I talked to you a few days ago and you gave me
a pass.”

Polly watched me with an unchanging
expression. “Go on. Read the rest.”

“Touched a client, drove a vehicle for three
blocks while still invisible, used more than twice the recommended
dose of Beastie Discombobulator Dust on a client’s dog. Hey, nobody
even trained me how to use that stuff. Totally not my fault.”
Despite my anger—and admittedly, a good helping of fear—my hands
didn’t shake anymore.

Polly folded her hands on her desk. “It
sounds as if you’ve got an excuse lined up for everything. All of
those rules you broke were in your handbook.” The disappointment in
her voice made the melody of it sound a little flat. “Audrey came
to me earlier and admitted she didn’t give you as much training as
she should have. However, you could have learned it all from the
handbook. Did you not even bother to read it?”

Despite my effort to remain cool and calm, a
short bark of laughter escaped me.
“The handbook? I didn’t even know about it until this morning. Ask
Audrey. We found it in my trashcan on my desktop. So, not only did
I get lousy training, I had nowhere to go for answers.” I pulled my
folder from my pack and placed my three assignments in front of
her. I poked a finger at the various fields. “You see that? No
explanation filled in for Mark’s project. I was flying blind. See
the deadlines on all three? Take special note of the smudges on the
numbers where someone changed them so I’d think I had a week longer
than I actually did.”

Polly rubbed her finger on the numbers,
making the smudge more apparent. “What the hell?”

By now I’d worked up a pretty good rage. My
voice was shaking. So much for cool and calm. “You ready for the
best part?”

“Mighty Aphrodite, I have a feeling I’m not.
But go ahead.”

“It turns out my ex-boyfriend works in the
Dreams and Nightmares department and he’s been sabotaging my
progress. He had all three of my clients talked into quitting their
projects. The only way to figure that out and talk them back around
was by breaking the stupid rules.” I paused, thinking I was done,
then remembered one last thing that upset me—because, hey, if
you’re going to blow up your career, you should be thorough, right?
“And what is wrong with this office? Nobody would help me. Dave and
Jeremy are a couple of pigs. And you’re never in your office. I’ve
never been so alone in my life—and that’s saying something, because
I’m pretty much a loner. I needed help and there was no one. So,
yeah. I did what I had to do.”

I felt cleaned out, emptied. She could do
what she wanted to me, now. I didn’t care. At least I would go to
the Underworld knowing I’d done my best. I sat again, folded my
hands, and waited.

Polly stared at the paperwork in her hands.
“Wynter, I’m so sorry. Word came down from higher up that I was to
keep an eye on you but to let you get on by yourself. I had no idea
why. I do know they don’t usually give three clients to a Muse on
her first week.” She rubbed the spot on her forehead again. “But
the rest of this is too much. I can’t allow someone to sabotage my
Muses.”

“So, now what? Do I just go back to
work?”

Polly rose from her chair and walked around
her desk to lean against it. “No. That’s not even an option. I
called you in here to give you orders to pack your desk and report
to staffing in the Underworld.”

Despite my earlier bravado, my stomach felt
queasy. “But circumstances…”

She nodded. “Yes. Circumstances. I’m going
to need your ex-boyfriend’s name. I’ll look into all of this. And
you are going home to wait for my decision.”

I blinked. “Home to wait? You mean…a
suspension?”

“You still broke rules, Wynter. Go home. Let
me get to the bottom of this. Shouldn’t take more than a week or
so.”

“What about my clients? What about their
deadlines?”

She pursed her lips. “No longer your
concern.” She went back to her chair and settled in. “Make sure you
leave your belt on the hook.”

And with that, I was dismissed. It was as if
I were no longer in the room. How people could turn compassion on
and off that quickly was beyond me.

I exited through a sea of anxious faces.
Audrey, especially, looked upset. I stopped at my desk to see if I
needed to take anything, but the only things there were the kitschy
candy dish, photo of Mom, and the stuffed giraffe. I left them
there. It made me feel better to still have a claim on the
desk.