"Shanna Swendson - Enchanted, Inc" - читать интересную книгу автора (Swendson Shanna)

schedule. To add to my run of good luck, the up escalator at the Whitehall station
was actually working. I emerged topside
among the soulless modern glass skyscrapers, went into the lobby of my building,
and paused to change into my work shoes. Then I put on my employee ID badge,
got cleared by the lobby security guard, and headed for the elevator bank that served
my floor.

I was seven minutes early when I stepped off the elevator into our lobby, and I was
five minutes early when I reached my cubicle, but my boss Mimi was already lurking.
I wondered which Mimi had shown up for work today, the best buddy or the evil
beast from hell that would rip me apart with her hairy-knuckled hands. Mimi was
about as stable as Dr. Jekyll.

Okay, so I'm exaggerating a little bit. Even on her bad days, her knuckles weren't all
that hairy.

'"Morning, Katie!" she called out as I neared my cubicle. "How was your weekend?"
It looked like the good Mimi had shown up for work today. There was no telling
how long it would last, so I kept a safe distance and looked for something heavy to
use for self-defense, just in case.

"It was great. And yours?"

She sighed blissfully. "Fabulous. Werner and I spent the weekend at his place in the
Hamptons." Werner was her richer-than-God (and almost as old) boyfriend. She
leaned toward me and added in a whisper, "I think he's getting ready to propose."

"Wow, really?" I said, faking enthusiasm as I edged past her and got to my desk.

"You never know. See you at the staff meeting."

I sat down at my desk and turned on my computer. I'd hoped for a Mimi-free
morning before I had to deal with her at the torture exercise we called the Monday
staff meeting, but my luck for the day had apparently run out, even if that encounter
had been fairly benign. I sincerely wished that Good Mimi was still around when the
staff meeting started in fifteen minutes. Otherwise, I might find myself wishing the
trio of oddballs in the subway had kidnapped me. Whatever they might do to me
would likely be more pleasant than Mimi at her worst.

Although Mimi was my boss, she wasn't that much older than I was. While I'd been
running the business affairs of my family's feed-and-seed store in a small town in
Texas, she'd been earning her MBA at some fancy upper-crust school. I'd learned
very quickly after getting to New York that the degree and related credentials and
contacts counted for a lot more than real-world experience, especially the kind of
real-world experience I had. A BBA from a public university in Texas and a few
years actually running a small business didn't get me much credit in the New York
business world.

In fact, I wouldn't even have this job as assistant to the marketing director (in other
words, Mimi's personal slave) if one of my roommates hadn't worked her own