THE OFFICE (II)

"Yesss hunny! You know how to laugh too? Where have you been all my life, my love? I'm Mariano by the way, Antonio's cousin". He stretched his hands for a handshake.

Oh, cousins? She thought, finally understanding the relationship. She received his hands with a smile. She had decided already that she liked Mariano.

"Okay great introductions. Can we show her to her office now?" Antonio feeling left out of the new friendship, coughed.

"Oh of course." Mariano linked her hands in his, and sashayed out of the office, with a seething Antonio following behind.

Just further down the hall, they stepped into an office.

"Here it is!" Mariano beamed.

Red gasped, and her eyes widened.

The office itself was simply amazing, but the outside view beckoned in her, so she poked her head out of the window.

She gasped again.

There was a big fountain, and when the sun rays converged in the middle, it sparkled.

"This is amazing!" She said breathlessly.

"I know right?" Mariano giggled, while Antonio studied her carefully.

After gazing longingly at the magical view, wishing she could dip herself into the water, she turned around and examined the details of the office. She had an office table and chair facing directly opposite the door entrance. Two cream colored leather sofas, were placed side by side on a fur rug. She looked up and saw a golden crystal chandelier. The walls were painted with olive green and placed on each sides of the wall, were huge paintings. On the left side was a painting of the famous work of Vincent Van Gough 'The Starry Night,' and on the right side was a rather interesting art piece. It was an array of green light that seemed like it was trying to move towards a man, but the man was painted in a way that looked like he was avoiding the colours. His head was bowed and he looked to be in pain. Red was fascinated with that particular painting. She didn't know how, but could somehow understand and relate to the man in the painting. After what seemed like forever, she finally pulled away from the painting, and moved to the shelve. She picked up a book which happened to be one of her first published works.

"This was so thoughtful," She whispered to herself. Then turned around. "Isn't this too much?"

"No it's not" Antonio finding his voice once again, said. He had watched with morbid fascination as she had taken every detail of the room. He could tell she loved it. He had personally asked his mum to design her office space. There was no other person he could trust to do a better job than his mother. He knew he was investing too much of his attention, but he couldn't imagine it any other way.

"You've chosen to help us when you could easily have gone the easier route by writing nasty stories about my family, just like the other journalists and writers do. You deserve the best" Antonio said.

This time, Red really looked at Antonio Lorenzo. Despite how tall she was, he hovered over her by many inches. His body was built by God himself and it was perfect. She found his eyes the most attractive as it reminded her of an eclipse. His legs were deliciously long. She looked at his black hair he had tied into a man bun. She would give anything to see it let lose and free.

That hair, that eyes.

Their eyes met, and he smiled. She felt a jolt of electricity run through her, and she shuddered. He was a handsome man no doubt, but when he smiled, it was dangerous.

Who is Antonio Lorenzo? The man that had been nothing but kind to her since she laid eyes on him, or the man the media wrote about?

She was conflicted even as she stared at him, and he, her.

Mariano noticed the silent stares, and smiled. He had found his next project.

"Alright Toni. We should leave Red to her office now." He said dragging his reluctant cousin.

"Tell my PA if you need anything."

"Sure." She smiled, watching the cousins leave.

As soon as she was all alone, she ran to get her phone and dialled Agnes.

"Ag! It has the most beautiful view ever!" She screamed into the phone as soon as Agnes picked up the call.

Silence.

"Hello? Agnes are you there?" She walked around her office hoping. "What's the noise about? Are you in a mining room? Why can't I see anything? Am I looking at your butt? What the hell Agnes!"

She was about to end the it in frustration when she heard Agnes.

"Oh My God! So sorry Red, I had no idea I had picked your call" She waved, looking all sweaty.

"Where are you?" She squinted her eyes trying to pick out Agnes's location.

"It was going to be a surprise, but I may as well show you," she turned the camera around."Tada! We started construction on the site for our new office location."

"Hell yeah! That's more like it Miss Agnes." She squealed, and clapped.

"So what is it you wanted to tell me?" Agnes asked when their excitement had subsided.

"Oh, you missed my grand intro so I'll have to start again. Are you ready?" Red beamed.

"Shoot."

"Ag, it has the most beautiful view ever!" She walked towards the window, showing Agnes the fountain view.

"It's beautiful Ag. Just look around. The walls, paintings, placements and arrangement of everything is so unique and well thought out. They even have a shelf filled with books, and I found some of my earlier published works there. This camera is probably not doing justice to the view. You need to see this too Ag, you'll absolutely love It." Red was out of breath when she was done.

"I can tell it's stunning, and I'm glad you love it."

"I really do. I have to go now Ag."

"Talk to you later munchkin."

Red took a long breath and walked to her seat, ready to commence her job. She placed her portable laptop she carried everywhere on the table, making a mental note to bring some of her special miniature decorations to be placed on the table too. She tried to imagine what it would look like after she may have placed her cheap decors on it. She shuddered in irritation. She couldn't do the room such a disservice. She could careless if anyone thought her vain for that, but how do you take any sort of poverty and place it on such luxury? The irony of her thoughts registered when she caught a reflection of herself on a shiny decor on the table.

"You are the poor" She whispered to herself. "But not for too long." She cheesed.

She inserted her password, and giggled.

"Red'f the York." Just the way her father used to call her when she first arrived in New York.

She quickly accessed the new website that had been designed for all things relating to the family. It was like their personal gossip blog created to control the narrative. She started by searching up the reactions of people from seeing a Love struck family blog suddenly pop up. She squinted trying to read the comments.

"Of course they do this. So predictable, *scoffs"

"You see why we say we need to eat the rich? Cus how are they trying to buy the press instead of allowing their rapist son be convicted. Help! xcevffnksxs"

"Oh you just know it's bad for them when they scurry to create a blog to control the narrative. Get them cops!"

"Oh they're so cancelled but damn, Antonio is a fine ass man."

Her eyes popped reading the first four comments with the highest interaction. She had known it was bad, but not this bad. She didn't understand how they had all this nasty things to say over an alleged rumour but still insisted on using the dating app. If you're going to cancel a family, shouldn't it involve everything they owned? Red rolled her eyes at the hypocrisy of people.

Next, she searched for Kim Anderson the woman accusing Antonio of sexual assault. The search result revealed a pretty young lady who looked about twenty-one. She viewed her Wikipedia page to see more about the girl.

Born: 1 December 2000 (age 20 years), Houston Texas, United States.

Full name: Kim Meghan Anderson

Siblings: None

Parent: Stella Anderson

Occupation: Bartender

Relationship status: Single

Red tried to browse through her Instagram page but saw that she had gone private on all her socials. She was inclined to believe women always. But she had met Antonio, and the whole situation confused her.

Of course she didn't know him enough to call him blameless. Still, she couldn't see him doing this.

Was it worth it? She questioned herself. Slowly, she began to laugh at the mere thought of that. She was way too ambitious to be bothered about the authenticity of an accusation, as long as she was getting paid. It was a crazy way to live, but once you've tasted poverty, you never want to return to it. You will always do everything in your power to fight it off She chose to go with her gut feeling. Whether it was to justify her salary or because she really believed it, didn't matter. She would be damned if she sabotaged her mouth watering pay on the basis of mere allegations. Maybe she would even end up discovering it was all a hoax. Then, she would be justified, or not.

She started to compose her very first article focused on the company and the success it had managed to attain after all these years, when a call came in. Her heart skipped a bit when she looked at the screen. It was the unknown number from the other day. She contemplated if she should pick up or not and finally decided to let it ring. She was not going to let some robotic voice put fear in her. She tried to concentrate on drafting the article, but the phone wouldn't stop ringing. Sighing in frustration, she turned down the volume of her phone.

"Peace at last."

She breathed in a sigh of relief, proud of herself for not giving in to the bullying tactics of that damned robot. Her dad would be so proud of her right now. Her mother in and how tough she was? much prouder. Suddenly, the message icon popped up on her phone indicating she had received a new message. She opened the message, sure it was one of Agnes's random texts.

"Dear Miss Red," The first line read, and she turned pale. The message did not come from Agnes like she had imagined. Instead, it was from that damned robot. She immediately pushed the phone aside. Her mind was in turmoil as she scrambled to think of what to to do. She noticed her body was beginning to shake, and knew she was in trouble. Trying and failing to stop her hands from trembling uncontrollably, she took a few minutes to wait for her heartbeat to return to normal. She gathered some courage, and continued through the text.

"You couldn't have been more obvious even if you tried. You think you can wiggle your way out of this by just not picking your calls? For someone who has won lots of awards for her abilities, you are quite dumb. We were willing to provide you with an information we believed you needed, but after this stunt you just pulled, we've had a change of heart. You will do as we say regardless of your personal feelings about it. This is what you will be doing for us. You will create an anonymous page where you will post everything we desire you post. You will also continue to work with the Lorenzo's so don't fret. It is left to you to figure out a way to juggle these two responsibilities. Also, you will be required to turn in ten percent of your salary monthly, to an account that will be sent to you. Failure to do this, we will paint the whole of New York City with the blood of your mother. If you also try to involve the police, you will be dropped dead before you take your next breath. This is not child's play Miss Red. Check the attachment below to see solid proof of our seriousness."

Red's hands trembled as she clicked on the attached file, and saw different pictures of her mom.They were pictures of her in her farm, garden, and even in the orphanage home she visited on weekends. The last picture Red viewed caused her stomach to retch. She stopped herself just in time from emptying its contents on her luxurious fur rug. It was a distorted image of both her Mum, and Agnes photo shopped in a pool of blood. Red finally let the tears fall down her eyes. She hadn't understood what she was getting herself into when she took this job. She signed up to fight internet trolls, and not real life demons who were threatening to kill her mum and best friend, if she refused to bend to their will. It was much. On one hand , there was the possibility of a guilty family, and on the other hand, she had an anonymous bully threatening to end her if she did not go against the very family that was willing to help her. She was caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. The image she was sent was stuck in her head forever.

"Not today please." She held her chest, writhing in pain.