Chapter 21

Rowena

I sank down into the hard plastic chair of my little office and looked around with a sigh.

How was this possible? For three weeks, I had been working my ass off in the manager’s office. For three weeks, I had been receiving top scores in my internship assessments. Hell, since I had come to this school, I had done nothing but prove my abilities and my worth.

And yet, in the span of one day, all of that had already changed.

Heather, on her first day of her internship, already had more votes than I did. And to make matters worse, she had effectively booted me out of the main manager’s office and I had been demoted to the utility closet down the hall.

I rubbed my eyes and looked at the little closet that was now my ‘office’.

With the pipes connected to the walls, the stack of boxes taking up almost half of the room, and the folding table that I now called a desk, it was pathetic. I still didn’t even have somewhere for visitors to sit if they needed medical assistance, and besides…

How would they even know that they could come here for help?

In fact, as I rose from my rickety little chair and walked over to the open doorway, the students passing by didn’t even look in my direction.

“Excuse me,” I called out to a random passerby—a girl with red hair and an athletic build. “Do you need any medical assistance? A check-up, maybe?”

The girl stopped and looked at me, her green eyes warily flickering to the dimly lit room behind me. “In there?” she asked.

“Yes. I’m Rowena, the combat management intern. This is my office.”

The girl paused, then a smirk twitched at the corners of her lips. “Yeah. Whatever you say,” she said coolly. Her ponytail flipped over her shoulder as she turned to walk away, her last word biting. “Weirdo.”

As I watched her go, I felt my heart sink; although, it wasn’t so much her words that hurt.

It was the fact that no one was going to even consider going into my creepy little closet for any sort of exam.

If I wanted to gain support and acknowledgement, then I would need to make people realize that my office was here, and that I was accepting visitors.

And to do that, I needed advertisement.

…

The scissors cut easily through the colorful construction paper. Snip, snip, snip.

Just like I did with the kitchen knife in Eric’s cottage, I imagined Heather at the other end of these scissors. Her hair, maybe. I imagined how good it would feel to see her crowning glory fall to the floor, leaving what was left a jagged mess.

Not that I would actually ever do something like that. But a girl could dream, right?

Lost in my reverie, I didn’t hear the art room door open, nor did I notice that I was no longer alone until I heard a familiar voice coming from behind me.

“Since when do you make art, Rowena?”

I jerked my head up, scissors still in hand, to see Eric leaning against a nearby table. He looked at me curiously; he must have slipped in while I was lost in my head. Instead of answering his question, I held up one of my finished signs.

“What do you think?” I asked.

Eric pushed away from the table, furrowing his brow as he took the handmade sign from me. I had made them out of layers of colorful paper, carefully constructing an image of a first aid sign.

“Rowena’s Management Office,” Eric read out loud with a quirk of his eyebrow. “Room 205b, utility closet…?”

As he read, he slowly lifted his gaze to meet mine and shot me a quizzical look. “Utility closet?” he repeated. “Why are you making flyers for a utility closet? Is it some kind of joke?”

I shook my head and returned to my cutting. “Nope,” I answered. “I’m trying to drive traffic to my office.”

“I thought you were in the main office,” Eric said slowly.

A scoff escaped my lips. “I was. Until Heather got involved.”

“Heather?”

My hands started to shake slightly just at the mention of her name, and I slapped them down onto the counter and turned to face Eric brusquely.

“You haven’t heard?” I said. “On her first day as a combat management intern, not only has Heather already amassed more votes than me, but she also got me kicked out of the main office and took my place.”

Eric’s face seemed to darken at my words. “She what?” he hissed. “She got you kicked out?”

“Yep. So now the utility closet down the hall is my new ‘office’.”

“I won’t allow it.” Eric suddenly turned on his heel, his brilliant blond hair fluttering slightly as he began storming toward the door. “I’ll handle this, Rowena.”

But I chased after him. “Eric, no!” I whirled around him and placed myself between him and the door, outstretching my arms to keep him from getting through. He stopped mere inches away from me; his furious breath exhaling from his nose tickled my skin, causing my own hair to bristle at the sensation.

“Move, Rowena. I said I would handle this.”

“And I say no,” I retorted. “I can handle it myself.”

Eric paused, eyeing me suspiciously for a few moments before he took a step back and folded his arms across his chest. “And is making colorful signs your way of ‘handling it’?” he teased.

I frowned and lowered my arms. “It’s part of it, yes,” I said quietly. I sighed then, dropping my gaze momentarily. “Look, I don’t want my big brother always coming around to bully people into treating me the right way.”

“Bully people?”

“Yes. Like you did with Emma.”

Eric’s blue eyes widened. “She tried to kill you, Rowena.” His voice came out in a low growl. “Someone had to put her in her place, and I’d do it again in a heartbeat. You know that.”

“Yes. I know.” I paused and let my shoulders slump a bit. “And I appreciate what you did that night. But… I want to handle this on my own. I’m eighteen now, not a child who needs coddling.”

“Fine.” Eric huffed and pushed a loose strand of blond hair out of his face. “Have it your way. But if she pulls any more stunts with you, I’m ending it.”

“And cause trouble with your new girlfriend?” I teased.

His eyebrows raised. “Who, Heather?” He scoffed. “Just because she was my homecoming date doesn’t mean that she’s my girlfriend.”

“Oh, please,” I said with a wave of my hand. I brushed past him to return to my work. “I remember how you two hooked up for a long time; if you haven’t already, you’ll at least start hooking up again. You two can’t keep your hands off of each other.”

Suddenly, as I passed by, Eric’s hand shot out and caught my wrist. My breath became lodged in my throat as he whipped me around to face him, my lower back pressed into the table behind me.

He reached up slowly, his warm fingers grazing my cheek as he brushed a stray curl out of my eyes. When he spoke, his voice was a low, husky whisper that made my spine shiver beneath his blue-eyed gaze.

“I already found another person to make me keep my hands off of Heather.”