Chapter 7: When Life Gives You a Hot, Shitty Boss…You Make a Computer Program

“Dear god, just strike me down now!” Octavia wailed.

She collapsed onto the couch in the living room, having only just stumbled through her front door seconds before.

Gracie was lounging in one of the armchairs, reading an old ~Popular Mechanics~ magazine, and Sierra was at the nearby dining table, painting her toenails.

“That bad, huh?” Gracie said, flipping a page.

In response, Octavia groaned into the couch cushions.

Sierra blew on her toenails and said between gusts of breath, “Please. How bad can it be working for the sexiest man on earth?”

Octavia rolled onto her side and slapped a hand over her eyes.

“Pretty fucking bad,” she replied.

“It’s only been a week,” Gracie said.

“A pretty fucking bad week,” Octavia answered.

Gracie shrugged and flipped another page.

Octavia’s first week had definitely been hell. Forget hit the ground running. Mr. Raemon Kentworth seemed to expect her to hit the ground with engines on full blast, going at 200 miles per hour.

Every other minute he made some new, complicated demand of her.

Some other report she had to find, some other manufacturing plant data sheet she had to pull up, some sales metric she had to print out and have on his desk, in his office, AT ONCE.

Luckily, she was able to figure her way around her office devices quickly enough.

But from then on, it was a constant struggle to find all the information he requested and have it delivered to him by, like, yesterday.

To make matters worse, the man barely stayed still for a second. Wherever he went, she was expected to go too.

Already she had been forced to accompany him to several plant visits, tag along to twenty different meetings with his investors, and accompany him to meetings at restaurants with potential customers.

She barely had time to think, dreading when he’d throw some new demand her way.

Her one consolation was that Raemon Kentworth was a man of consistency. He wasn’t just rude and demanding with her. He was like that to everyone.

Octavia couldn’t believe it when she first accompanied him on a plant inspection.

The plant manager walked them through the building, nervously rattling off information to Mr. Kentworth, who made no effort to look as if he was listening.

“We’ve managed to reduce our inventory by fifteen percent,” the plant manager was saying. He kept wiping sweat from his bald head, his eyes darting nervously from Mr. Kentworth’s face to the area around them.

He seemed terrified of them encountering something that would incur Mr. Kentworth’s wrath, like a tool that hadn’t been put back in its proper place or something.

“Fifteen percent?” Mr. Kentworth repeated lazily. “Amazing. You must be so proud of your minuscule achievements.”

The plant manager was silent.

“I expect the output of this plant to be double what it is right now,” Mr. Kentworth continued.

“Sir…we, uh…have had some issues as you know.”

“Such as?”

Under Mr. Kentworth’s raised eyebrow, the manager faltered.

“Well…some of our equipment has been malfunctioning,” the manager started. “We’re still trying to troubleshoot that with the manufacturers.

“And as you know, there was that power outage a few days ago. And with the new batch of employees, we have to focus on training for now.”

Mr. Kentworth’s face didn’t change, but Octavia felt the disdain emanating from him.

“Of course. All valid excuses,” Mr. Kentworth remarked. “But still excuses. Something I don’t accept. I expect things to improve here in the next month.

“I don’t care if every assembler has to put in overtime. Get this plant’s operation up to what I want it to be or start looking for a new job.”

But it wasn’t long before Octavia witnessed another unfortunate victim to Mr. Kentworth’s endearing personality, one that made the interaction with the plant manager seem pleasant in comparison.

They were walking out of a ritzy restaurant where Mr. Kentworth had been meeting with some of his associates one afternoon.

Raemon was doing his usual brisk stride out the entrance, and behind him, Octavia was fumbling to slide her laptop back into her bag while keeping up with her boss.

That was when a voice called out, “Raemon! Raemon! It’s you, finally!”

Mr. Kentworth stopped, and Octavia barely managed to avoid bumping into him.

Mr. Kentworth turned to face the speaker, a tall, slender, dark-haired beauty who trotted up to them and stood before Raemon, staring into his eyes with a spark in her own.

“I knew you’d come by this place sooner or later,” she said breathlessly, placing a manicured hand on Mr. Kentworth’s arm.

A quick glance at the woman’s cream dress, perfect skin, gold heels, and impossibly white teeth was enough to tell Octavia that the woman before her was probably someone famous.

And the way she addressed her boss indicated that she was probably someone Mr. Raemon Kentworth dated.