Chapter 2 - The Job She Refused to Beg For
Josie did not celebrate the job offer on the bus ride home.
She read the internal note until the letters stopped looking like words.
WHITAKER MUST NOT REACH CHAIRMAN’S OFFICE.
It was too specific.
Not “candidate unsuitable.”
Not “insufficient experience.”
Her name.
The chairman’s office.
She called Mrs. Hattie from the last stop.
“Well?” the older woman demanded before Josie could speak.
“I got it.”
A shriek came through the phone.
In the background Toby yelled, “Two-flavor ice cream!”
Josie laughed despite herself.
“Yes. Two flavors.”
Mrs. Hattie lowered her voice.
“You sound worried.”
Josie looked through the bus window at a laundromat sliding past.
“The receptionist had been blocking my application.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you know her?”
“No.”
“Then she knows somebody who knows you.”
That simple sentence followed Josie all the way home.
Toby met her at the door wearing one sock and carrying a green dinosaur.
“Are we rich?”
“No.”
“Medium rich?”
“Not remotely.”
“Two-flavor rich?”
Josie set down her bag.
“On Friday.”
He nodded solemnly.
“Acceptable.”
That night she made boxed macaroni, sliced an apple into eight pieces, and did not tell Toby about Priscilla.
Children did not need every adult fear translated for them.
They needed dinner, medicine, predictable bedtime, and someone who answered when they called from the dark.
At 7:40 the next morning, Josie entered Relli Group through a side security desk.
Mara Quinn, Luca’s chief of staff, met her with a temporary badge.
“You’re early.”
“I’m employed.”
“Those aren’t the same thing.”
“They are this week.”
Mara was forty-five, elegant, severe, and possessed the calm of someone who had watched powerful men panic over printer failures.
She walked Josie through the executive floor.
Luca’s office.
Two conference rooms.
A secured records suite.
A smaller office for Josie with a view of three brick rooftops and one enormous air conditioner.
“It’s beautiful,” Josie said.
Mara looked through the glass.
“You’re easy to please.”
“It has a door.”
Mara studied her.
Josie smiled.
“I temped in an open-plan call center.”
“Ah. Trauma.”
By ten, Josie understood why the position had been open.
The previous secretary had left with three weeks’ notice.
Two replacements had lasted less than a month.
Luca’s calendar was a battlefield.
Hotel executives.
Port attorneys.
Union representatives.
City officials.
A priest.
A surgeon.
Three names marked only with initials.
And one repeating private meeting every Thursday at 6:30 p.m. labeled FAMILY.
Josie did not ask.
If Luca wanted her to know, he would tell her.
At 11:12, he stepped into her doorway.
“No coffee.”
She looked up.
“Excuse me?”
“You don’t need to bring me coffee.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“Good.”
“You seem disappointed.”
“I’ve had four assistants who thought the job was beverages.”
“Did they read the description?”
“Apparently not.”
He set a folder on her desk.
“Priscilla.”
Josie’s stomach tightened.
“I thought HR was reviewing.”
“They are. This is the part that affects you.”
Inside were application logs.
Josie’s original submission seven months earlier.
It had passed automated screening with a high score.
Priscilla rejected it manually forty-seven minutes later.
Two months after that, when the role reopened, an HR system automatically reconsidered prior high-score candidates.
Priscilla manually rejected Josie again.
Four days ago, a new internal audit restored several applications.
Priscilla rejected Josie a third time.
Then HR overrode her and issued the interview.
Josie looked up.
“So she was waiting for my name.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“We don’t know.”
“She said she could tell ‘girls like me’ by looking.”
Luca’s jaw tightened.
“That may be part of it.”
“Part?”
“Eight candidates were blocked repeatedly.”
Josie turned the page.
Seven women.
One man.
Different ages.
Different races.
No obvious pattern.
Then she saw the employers.
Three had worked for medical nonprofits.
Two had operations experience in hospitals.
One had been an insurance appeals coordinator.
Josie pointed.
“This isn’t random.”
“No.”
“Why would a receptionist care about medical backgrounds?”
“That’s what Mara asked.”
He handed her another sheet.
Priscilla’s employee access logs showed she had opened records outside her job function.
Relli Foundation.
HeartBridge Program.
Josie went still.
She knew the name.
Every parent at the children’s cardiology clinic knew it.
HeartBridge covered surgical gaps for families whose insurance left catastrophic balances.
Josie had applied two months earlier.
Denied.
Fund exhausted.
Her skin went cold.
“My son applied to HeartBridge.”
Luca’s attention sharpened.
“When?”
“June.”
“What happened?”
“They said the year’s fund was fully committed.”
He did not speak for a second.
Then he asked, “What’s Toby’s full name?”
Josie folded the page.
“No.”
He stopped.
“No?”
“I’m not giving you his information so you can pull strings because I work here.”
“That wasn’t my intent.”
“Then what was?”
“To determine whether Priscilla accessed your family’s application.”
Josie hesitated.
That was different.
Still, she shook her head.
“Ask the foundation to investigate applicant access generally. Don’t start with Toby.”
Luca studied her.
“You don’t want special treatment.”
“I want the same treatment everyone was supposed to get.”
He nodded once.
“Fair.”
That afternoon, Priscilla’s replacement arrived from another office.
Nobody discussed the scandal.
That impressed Josie.
By six, she had reorganized Luca’s Monday briefing packet and found a meeting conflict involving two men who apparently refused to sit in the same room.
Mara looked delighted.
“You may live.”
“High praise.”
At 6:18, Josie packed her bag.
Luca appeared again.
“You leave at six.”
“That’s what I’m doing.”
“Good.”
“You really expect people to go home?”
“I expect people to do their jobs.”
“That answer was suspiciously healthy.”
“My reputation is suffering.”
She smiled.
At the elevator, he said, “Whitaker.”
She turned.
“There’s one thing you should know before tomorrow.”
His expression had become serious.
“My family name comes with stories.”
“I have Google.”
“Google has the polite version.”
Josie waited.
“My father built parts of this company beside men I no longer do business with. Some of them still think they have a vote.”
“The Thursday family meeting.”
His eyes narrowed.
“You read calendars.”
“It’s literally my job.”
A faint smile.
Then it vanished.
“If anyone approaches you claiming they speak for me, verify it.”
“Anyone?”
“Anyone.”
“Including family?”
“Especially family.”
Josie thought of Priscilla’s invented intimacy.
“Understood.”
Her phone rang.
Mrs. Hattie.
Josie answered immediately.
“Hattie?”
The older woman’s voice was tight.
“Don’t panic.”
Every parent knew that sentence was an instruction to panic.
“What happened?”
“Toby got dizzy at school. Nurse says he’s awake. They’re sending him to Children’s.”
The elevator doors opened.
Josie could not move.
Luca saw her face.
“What?”
“My son.”
She pressed the elevator button twice, too hard.
“He’s going to the hospital.”
Luca did not ask whether she needed permission to leave.
He stepped back.
“Go.”
“I need—”
“Go, Josie.”
She ran.
By the time she reached the lobby, Mara had texted that a car was waiting outside.
Josie almost refused it.
Then she imagined the Route 11 bus making sixteen stops while Toby sat beneath hospital lights.
She got in.
At Children’s, Toby was pale but talking.
“Mama, the nurse says I’m dramatic.”
The nurse laughed.
“I said your story about collapsing during math improved with every retelling.”
Josie kissed his forehead.
Dr. Ogden arrived twenty minutes later.
The dizziness was concerning but not catastrophic.
Another test.
Another discussion.
The surgery timeline moved forward.
“Three months,” he said quietly in the hallway. “I don’t want to wait six anymore.”
Josie leaned against the wall.
“Okay.”
“We’ll have financial counseling call again.”
“Okay.”
Her phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
She almost ignored it.
Then saw the message.
YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED OUT OF RELLI GROUP.
A second text appeared.
HEARTBRIDGE CAN’T SAVE YOUR SON.
Josie stopped breathing.
May you like
A third message followed.
AND NEITHER CAN LUCA RELLI.
