“…a delight to meet our new owner, Elena Bartell.” Maddie’s editor, a bespectacled, harried-looking man whom she had never had cause to meet—so lowly was her status—stepped back, clapping.
Bartell stood in front of the eighty Hudson Metro News staff members and waited for the polite applause to die. She held the ensuing silence until the only sounds were someone’s phone in the distance and the clatter of a printer spitting out pages nearby. Her voice was measured and pitched low, yet it carried to the back of the room where Maddie stood, half hidden by a pillar.
“I’m sure my reputation precedes me,” Bartell said, voice dry. “I’m sure you’ve been told all sorts of terrible tales about who I am. I know the names I’ve been called, some more creative than others. And I’m sure you’ve been told all sorts of ruthless things about what I’m going to do to your paper.” She stopped and slid her gaze over the room. “And it’s all true.”
A panicked murmur spread through the crowd.
She eyed them coolly. “It’s time Hudson Metro News grew a pair or got out of the game. The facts don’t lie. You’re an underperforming commuter rag with only one news breaker on your entire reporting staff and only one ad rep who meets the sales targets. Your publication’s online presence is a joke. An occasional updated weather report, front pages from two days ago, and only two lines on where to buy advertising. Not to mention, with a balance sheet like yours, you deserve to be scrapped. It would be a mercy killing.”
Maddie winced. Okay, so it wasn’t the world’s greatest paper, but it wasn’t that bad, surely?
“Of course,” Bartell continued, “I could inject capital, grow your online presence with a cutting-edge website, and find you a team of star marketers to boost brand awareness. But this is a saturated market, and you have no point of difference. I’d be just throwing good money after bad.”
Maddie’s heart began racing, and she glanced at the ashen faces around her.
“However,” Bartell said, “funny things happen when backs are to the wall. Occasionally, in their death throes, people have the ability to surprise me. So the bottom line is this—you’re on notice. I’m giving you six weeks to impress me.”
Relieved and shocked gasps filled the room.
The media mogul held up her hand. “I will base myself here for the duration. It will give me an opportunity to assess who has talent, whether you deserve a financial investment, or whether being shut down would be a better option. If you have been holding back, then dazzle me in the coming six weeks. Be warned—my reputation for firing incompetent people on the spot is no lie. So, in six weeks’ time, on March 15, I’ll know whether any of you have what it takes. For your own sakes, do not disappoint me.”
March 15? The Ides of March? Maddie blinked.
Bartell’s gaze roamed, then paused on Maddie, sliding up and down her outfit. A frown creased her brow. “That’s it. We’re done.” She exited the room without another word.
The general manager adjusted his crimson silk tie, mumbled something vague and conciliatory about impressing their new boss, and the meeting broke up.
Maddie stared at Bartell’s departing figure. We’re done? What kind of interpersonal skills were those?
“Holy shit,” Terry, the court reporter beside her, said to no one in particular. “I need to call my wife. That shark’s gonna gut us. I could see it in her beady eyes.” He flicked a glance at Maddie’s outfit. “She sure didn’t like what you’re wearing, huh? Didn’t you get the memo she was coming in?”
“It’s my day off,” Maddie protested. “It’s not like I’m wearing a coat of freshly killed baby seals.”
Terry gave a sour laugh. “She’d probably want one if you did.”
“Yeah.” Maddie sighed. She was going to be out of work within six weeks for sure. One thing she knew about newspapers was that no one ever noticed the person on the graveyard shift. They weren’t seen or heard, and their jobs were never saved. With that depressing thought, she sidestepped the milling groups picking over Bartell’s speech and headed for the elevator. She had a bed to crawl back into.
When she reached the hallway, the elevator doors were closing, so she called out for the shadow she glimpsed inside to hold them. The doors kept closing. Maddie sprinted and threw her arm into the gap. The doors paused, then slowly reopened. She skidded inside, finding herself face to face with Elena Bartell, who looked irritated at having an interloper. So—travelling with minions was obviously against Bartell’s religion.
Maddie could smell her perfume, a soft, faintly spicy caress that made her want to sway forward for more. She stabbed the already lit up Ground button in annoyance at that random thought and leaned into the side wall as far away from Bartell as she could manage. She swung her gaze upward to the numbers ticking down.
“Bold choice,” Bartell abruptly said, shattering any hopes for escaping this elevator ride unscathed. “Does your garage band have practice now?”
“It’s my day off.” Maddie was startled to have been addressed. “I didn’t expect to be called in for your special Ides of March speech. The day Caesar got knifed? Interesting choice of dates.”
“A millennial who knows history? Well, well.”
Maddie shrugged.
“I suppose stranger things have happened.” Bartell examined Maddie’s clothing as though it offended her on a cellular level. “So you…voluntarily…wear this?”
Maddie frowned at the glint in those cool eyes. “Yeah,” she said in her most neutral tone. “I do. It’s comfy.”
“Even knowing I’d be here today to evaluate you all.”
“Are you planning on firing me based on my outfit?” Maddie asked politely, turning to look at her properly.
“What if I did?” Bartell’s eyes were challenging. “One’s wardrobe choices speak to their professionalism and whether they wish to be taken seriously. As opposed to the appearance of having crawled out of a nightclub at 4:00 a.m. for example.”
“That’s…” Maddie shook her head in disbelief. “So…”
“Go on.” Bartell’s expression dared her.
“If you fire people because of what they wear, you could lose someone brilliant. What if someone had this incredible talent but couldn’t dress to save themselves? How’s that good business?”
Bartell gave her a sharp look. “And is that what you are? An incredible talent? Dressed up in a gothic sack, just waiting for me to bother unravelling?”
Maddie’s mouth fell open. She clanged it firmly shut. “I didn’t say that,” she mumbled.
“What do you do here?”
“The graveyard shift. I write briefs on the news events happening in the middle of the night. Sometimes they get followed up by the day shift and expanded on. Sometimes not.” Shit. I’m rambling. Maddie hastily jumped to the point. “Crime. I write crime. Mostly. And, um, obits.”
The edges of Bartell’s mouth twitched at that, which spiked Maddie’s irritation.
“And you’re not from New York. Not with that accent.”
“Sydney.”
