She Plans My Promotion, I'm Planning Divorce novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Rowan Group

Danielle picks him up, signs him on in an afternoon and sets rule one: she does not date staff. At lunch she says she wrote him twice years ago, and shows the sent emails he never saw.

The car that stopped at the curb was a gray sedan, and the woman driving it leaned across and pushed the passenger door open herself.

"Get in, Nathan."

Danielle Rowan wore a charcoal dress and no jewelry. Her dark hair was swept back off her face.

I got in, and she pulled away from the Danforth tower without looking up at it once.

"I read your last text at the red light," she said. "You didn't say what happened."

"I resigned."

"I figured. You don't send a message like that from a party." She glanced at the paper cup in my hand. "Did you eat?"

"I tried to buy a bagel. My cards are cancelled."

Her hands stayed steady on the wheel.

"All of them?"

"My wife moved the money out of my account twenty minutes after I quit."

Danielle was quiet through two lights.

"I'm going to say something and you can tell me to stop," she said. "That is a cruel thing to do to a man. Now you're drinking coffee on a curb."

I laughed. It surprised me.

It was the first real laugh I had had in months.

"Last night you told me you were married to Claire Danforth," she said. "I didn't push. I figured you'd tell me the rest if you wanted."

"I'll tell you the rest."

"Later," she said. "First we get you a badge."

Rowan Group sat on the river in an old brick building with a clock tower. Inside, nobody stared at me.

That was the first thing I noticed.

At Danforth, a new person got looked over and ranked. At Rowan, the receptionist said, "Welcome, Mr. Ames," and handed me a lanyard.

Danielle walked me through the floor herself.

She pointed to a glass office with my name already on the door.

"Vice president of operations," she said. "The last one retired in March. I held the seat."

"For me?"

"For whoever was good enough." She did not look at me. "That turned out to be you."

I stood in the doorway and did not trust my voice.

She went around the desk and took an envelope out of the drawer.

"Your first month's salary, in advance. I know your cards are dead. It's in cash because I didn't want to wait for payroll."

"I can't take that."

"You can pay me back out of your first check, with a lunch." She slid it across. "That's the deal."

I took it.

She held out her hand and I shook it.

"One more thing, and I say it to everybody on day one," Danielle said. "Rule one. I don't date staff."

"I wasn't..."

"I know." Her ears had turned a little pink. "I just like it said."

I nodded.

"Rule one," I said. "Understood."

We ate lunch in a small place near the river, at a table in the back.

I finished the first sandwich in four bites.

She watched me do it and did not comment, and that was kind.

"Nathan, can I ask why you didn't answer me?" she said, when I was on my second sandwich.

I looked up.

"Answer what? Last night I called you. Before that, I saw you at the freight conference in March, and you gave me your card."

"Before that."

She laid her phone on the table.

"Three years ago, I sent you an email. And then another one, two weeks later. I said I'd read your paper on routing failures and wanted you on my team. I said the offer had no expiration date." She turned the screen toward me. "I waited a long time."

I took the phone in both hands.

The sent folder showed two messages.

The first was dated three years ago, in October. The second was two weeks after that.

The address was correct. It was my old work email, the one I had used for six years.

I read the first line.

Mr. Ames, I don't usually write to people at other companies, but I read your paper on routing failures, and I think you're wasted where you are.

"I never saw these," I said.

"I figured." She did not look surprised. "You never answered, and I thought you didn't want to. I sent the second one to your work address and to a personal one I found."

"I never got any of them."

She leaned forward.

"Somebody did," she said. "Nobody deletes two messages by accident. Who has the password to your inbox?"

I put the phone down.

I could hear my own breathing.

"My wife," I said.

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