glad you’re coming. I never know anyone I actually want to hang out with and I have to go because Grandpa would go crazy if he heard I didn’t go, even though he never goes, but still he expects me to go which is complete double standards, you know?’
If my food hadn’t been so bloody awful, I might not have noticed that Delia was rambling. I stopped chewing for a moment and tried not to freak out. Delia was nervous. Delia was never nervous. What was going on?
‘The exec floor is really dull,’ she carried on, sipping water quickly and then punching her fork into yet more lettuce. ‘I don’t think they’re even doing secret Santa. Isn’t that awful? Grandpa says I’ll get used to it but I don’t know … Maybe it is too soon, maybe I don’t have the experience. I suppose we’ll see. How’s your appetiser?’
‘It’s horrible,’ I said, with fear in my heart. Whatever was going on, I really wanted to know before my main course arrived because if I was getting fired, I was changing my order to the burger and getting a cocktail while I still had a company credit card. ‘Delia, what’s wrong?’
‘Why would anything be wrong?’ she asked in a voice so high pitched it hurt my ears. ‘I’m just a little stressed. That’s all it is.’
Now I knew she was lying. Delia Spencer had never been stressed in her entire life. She was so in control, I had wondered more than once if she wasn’t actually some sort of media magnate cyborg, created by her grandfather to take over the family business. The only evidence to the contrary was her sister. Oh. Fuckity fuck. Of course, her sister.
‘Delia,’ I put down my fork. If she was going to say what I thought she was going to say, I was in for enough punishment, I didn’t need to suffer through another mouthful of superfood. ‘Is this about Cici coming in yesterday?’
She pursed her lips, looked down into her lap and nodded.
‘You mean your new assistant, Cici?’ she asked with unwarranted optimism.
‘You can’t mean it?’ I asked. She couldn’t. I hadn’t had a memo about everyone in the world going completely insane so this must just be a very, very late April Fool’s joke.
For a moment, there was an awkward silence at the table that had never existed between me and Delia before. I waited for her to laugh and tell me she was taking the piss and of course she didn’t genuinely expect me to have her clinically insane identical twin working on our magazine, on our baby, that we had fought so hard for, but she didn’t. She just sat there, pushing some sad little leaves around her plate and waiting for me to say something else. But I didn’t. I couldn’t.
‘I know everything you’re thinking,’ she said after realising that I wasn’t going to speak. ‘And you’re completely within your rights. I know it seems crazy to even think about having Cici around after, well, after everything.’
‘Can I get you ladies anything?’ An overly chirpy waitress in a shirt and tie appeared behind Delia.
‘Do you have anything that’s like a cosmo?’ I asked, unable to take my eyes off Delia. ‘Doesn’t have to be a cosmo but is definitely as strong as a cosmo?’
‘Uh, sure,’ she replied, with almost as much fear in her eyes as there was in mine. ‘Anything for you?’
‘Whatever you get for her,’ Delia muttered, throwing back her water in preparation for something harder hitting her stomach.
‘Two cosmos then,’ the waitress replied, backing away as fast as she could. Sharp instincts. She’d go far.
I took a deep breath, trying to calm down, but my heart was racing and I had a really bitter taste in my mouth. It could have been the quinoa but I was fairly certain it was just straight-up bile.
‘It’s going to sound dumb,’ Delia said, resting her elbows on the table and wiping her hands over her face, ‘but she really has changed.’
‘Because she spent a month at a spa in India and got a dodgy hair wrap?’
‘Maybe,’ she said, pulling on her ponytail. ‘And maybe because Grandpa threatened to cut her off if she doesn’t get another job.’
‘So make her your assistant if you want her around so badly.’ I was trying, but failing, not to squeak when I spoke. ‘She’ll be putting anthrax in my cappuccino within a week.’
‘Don’t you breathe in anthrax?’ she asked, reaching for her phone to Google it.
‘That’s not the point,’ I yelled, slapping the phone out of her hand. ‘There’s no other job in the entire company, the entire Spencer Media empire, that you can shove her in? I don’t believe it for a second.’
‘Of course there is,’ Delia replied. ‘But she wants to work at Gloss. We sat down and talked and I genuinely, genuinely think she’s changed. And for what it’s worth, I think she feels guilty about all the stuff she did to you, and to us. I’ll keep an eye on her, I’ll make sure she’s not up to anything, you have my word.’
‘You can’t babysit your psycho sister while you’re running a publishing company,’ I sighed as it dawned on me that I wasn’t getting a say in this. The deal was as good as done. ‘I just can’t believe you’re doing this to the magazine.’
‘There are two ways to look at it.’ Delia’s cheeks were red from embarrassment. I hated that she felt so uncomfortable, hated putting her in a position where she was torn between work, friendship and family. Unfortunately, I hated her sister more so she was just going to have to get used to it. ‘There is a chance that I’m right, that she isn’t lying and has finally woken up to what a total bitch she used to be. In which case, she’s really smart and she’s going to be an asset to the company. She’s a good assistant, she’s super smart, she kicks ass and she looks after her own.’
‘Because she’s always been so wonderful to you,’ I said, arms folded, bottom lip out, the full grumpy chops.
‘I was never her own,’ she admitted. ‘But she’s loyal to her friends and you have first-hand experience of how far she’ll go when she’s committed to achieving something. Maybe we’ll be able to use her power for good?’
‘Maybe,’ I nodded. ‘Can I just use your phone to check if Hell has frozen over?’
‘The other way to look at it is this,’ Delia said, ignoring me. Probably rightly so. ‘My grandpa is eventually going to cave and give her a job. Would you rather it’s the job she says she wants, in a place where you can keep an eye on her and have the whole staff keep her in check? Or would you rather she was somewhere else in the business, pissed off that you – in her eyes – have screwed her over again and dedicating every moment that she could be answering your phone to destroying your career?’
Well, when she put it like that …
‘You’re going to make me hire Cici as my assistant,’ I said, hardly believing the words as they came out of my mouth.
‘I’m not going to make you do anything,’ Delia replied. ‘Because I’m not an asshole. But it’s genuinely the best idea I have come up with. I’ve been over it a thousand different ways and I can’t think of a better solution. I know you don’t trust her and I don’t expect you to. It’s hard enough for me to give her another chance but really, I do believe she’s different.’
