Cocktail Hour Read Online Free PDF Page B

remembered her posture and straightened up.
    Now she sat, eyes glazed over and unseeing while trying to figure out her next gambit. Nothing was coming. Her brain was frozen over or something. Maybe she should pay attention to the presentation. Then she could comment on that, restarting their conversation as they walked out of the conference room together.
    There was an organizational chart on the screen showing the updated restructuring of the company. It was the third go-round in the last three years. It seemed that whenever members of management celebrated New Year's Eve on December thirty-first, their unanimous resolution was to rearrange the organization and throw it into the usual tumult of hirings and firings and hissy fits behind closed doors. It was as if they enjoyed the accompanying drama and loss of momentum in productivity and sales.
    No matter how they rearranged the positions on the chart, though, Chelsea remained firmly at the bottom: marketing department administrative assistant. It was one of the benefits of her job - no need to jockey for position or impress people, leaving her with plenty of time and energy to pursue her real mission in life: love and marriage. Not just love, but LOVE, all-caps blow-you-away soul-mate romance and magic and hearts and flowers and unicorns and rainbows. Everything she adored all piled in one big basket and topped with a big sparkly diamond ring. She knew she was destined for it, felt it every time the boy got the girl in a movie or a book and she burst into satisfying tears.
     That she hadn't found it yet, already thirty-three, disturbed her. But she kept her chin up, kept her eye on the prize. And currently, a potential prize - she wasn't one hundred percent sure about Travis, just had a feeling - was sitting right next to her in the shadowy room. As if answering her prayer, the presenter started to wind down with the usual final words about how TMB need their help to make the transition and that supervisors would be calling team meetings over the next few days; that it was paramount that everyone attend with a proactive team-centric mindset.
     Chelsea rolled her eyes - blah-blah-blah - and recapped her pen, the notepad in her lap note-free as usual, it being a point-grabbing prop rather than a tool. The room's lights flickered on and Chelsea stood, about to comment to Travis about the fact that he would now be heading up a completely different team, when a voice boomed behind her.
    "Chelsea! There you are," Kevin Fitch, her boss and an all-around-jerk, yelled. He was the COO, one of the top execs in the entire company, yet he screamed rather than spoke, as if he needed to continually prove that he was top dog.
    Chelsea startled and turned. "Oh! Yes?"
    Her boss's square face and close-set brown eyes reminded her of a cartoon. Except he wasn't funny, not even a little bit. Well, except when she laughed at him behind his back with the other admins. He said, "Glad I caught you. I need you to send out invites, get the meetings set up this afternoon. We're going to dive right in on this."
    Chelsea tried to keep her face very still. But cocktails with the girls. Tonight. Thursday. At Ibiza. The hottest night at the hottest bar with the hottest men…and potentially Mr. Right.  "But, it's already four-thirty. I mean, don't you-"
    He waved his fat hand in her face. "These people know what their priorities are. Just get back to your desk and send them out ASAP so we can catch everyone before they leave. Have the first one at 5:30, each a half hour."
    She nodded, a mixture of despair and aggravation filling her.
    He jerked his head. “Okay? Now?”
    “Okay,” she squeaked and turned around to see that the conference room had emptied out and Travis was long gone. She jogged away on her high heels, feeling her boss’s eyes on her, watching her go. The worst thing about working for Kevin? He had the hots for her. Married, old, and mean - and he lusted after her. Even though he was