Book II - 5

GABRIEL

“Mr. Stark?” Audrey placed a coffee on my desk two weeks later. Typically, I could just ask HR to reassign her, but I didn’t, even though looking at her made my blood boil.

I kept myself in control around her—to refrain from staring at her too long, but I couldn’t help being more contemptuous than ever. I made her responsible for my twice-a-day cup of coffee, demanded that she rearrange every fucking paper I had in my filing drawers, even if it was unnecessary, and re-do every assignment and proposal at least five times. Whenever she asked for my help, I simply answered her with ‘I’m busy.’

She never seemed offended or dismayed by my cruelty, which made me even angrier. I even asked her to run to a bookstore three hours away from the office, but along the way, I asked her to come back, telling her I didn’t need the book anyway. She came back to my office with a smile on her face. She even asked me if I still needed something before she left.

I thought having her work for me an