Page 125 of Maneater
“God-fucking-dammit.” I look around the busy room, noting a few staff members looking around, a bit overwhelmed. They’re probably looking for theirfucking boss. “All right. I’ll go break it up,” I grumble.
Josie lets out a laugh. “Have so much fun with that. I’ll be here, bored out of my mind, praying something exciting happens.”
I roll my eyes and shake my head despite the smile I’m wearing, then move through the resort to get my idiotic employees handled.
Twenty minutes later, I’m trying to clean the image of Daniel fucking Tanya and wipe the sound of her fake screams from my memory completely while trying to weigh what to do with Daniel tomorrow. Obviously fucking an employee during work hours when we have a high-profile guest being celebrated, and I specifically told everyone that all hands on deck today is absolutely grounds for a firing. However, in the next few days, our culprit will be found, and at the very least, I’ll have to fire our spa manager and the landscaping assistant manager. Having to also fire the GM probably wouldn’t be great for employee morale.
I’m on my way back to the party to fill Josie in on all of the new updates when I pass the lookout, the one Josie dragged me to on her first day here, the one where I almost kissed her. I smile at the memory, thinking that before we leave, I should make sure I get the chance to recreate that moment right there.
But my mind is quickly diverted when I see a dark form folded over near the railing. I step outside with concern, only to see that it’s not someone who has collapsed, thank God. Instead, it’s someone messing with the railing. Some kind of alarm bell goes offin my mind, something familiar flickering in my mind. But instead of heeding it, I step further outside to the lookout.
“Everything okay over here?” I ask. The man’s head pops up, and the world goes still.
This is Carter Short’s brother, Randy.
And he’s currently messing with the railing in some way. My mind flashes back to the spa massage table, the way Josie and Rory agreed it was meddled with precisely to collapse under the right pressure, and panic builds.
If he did the same here, it wouldn’t be someone injured on a broken massage table or tripping in the woods.
It would be death, certainly, with a drop that has to be at least forty feet onto the rocks below.
For a moment, when he looks at me, he’s panicked, like he has been caught, but then he looks around and realizes it’s the two of us before his shoulder goes back and a menacing grin comes over his face. He turns back to the railing, grabbing the last screw and slipping it into his pocket.
“You’re the VP, right?” he asks before standing casually. He looks rough, not just like he hasn’t had much sleep, but like he hasn’t bathed in a week or so. There’s a thick layer of hair on his face that we didn’t see in other photos; his hair is unkempt, and there are patches of sunburn on his face that make it feel like he’s spent an inordinate amount of time outside lately.
“I…” I hesitate, unsure of what to say, but I also know being too suspicious right now would be bad. “Yeah. VP of Operations.”
The man straightens and takes a step toward me. On instinct, I take a step back and over, trying to keep as much distance between us and inadvertently moving toward the railing.
“Mind if I ask what you’re doing over here?”
The look in his eye is a little unhinged, a little too far gone, and my heart rate picks up.
“If something happens toyou, Daniel will definitely lose his job,”he says, his eyes nearly feral.
For the first time since this all started, I don’t feel anxious or worried. Instead, I feel genuine fear. Up until now, most of the things this man has attempted have been indirect, as far as we know.
“They might not even suspect anything, just that he hasn’t been doing the regularly scheduled maintenance. You came out for some air, you leaned on the railing, andpoof!Gone.”
Keep him talking. Get some answers. I can’t remember if Josie and Rory bugged this area, but if they did and something happens to me, at least they’ll have the evidence they need.
“So that’s what this is about? All of the sabotage?”
He doesn’t speak, but I’m determined to get him talking. I could overpower him: he’s a good bit shorter than I am, but he also has a wild look in his eyes, and thereisa cliff a foot behind me that he could easily push me over if he really wanted to. As I moved to gain space between us, I realized belatedly that I had moved closer to the railing than I would like right now.
“I saw you flirting with her, too. Double duty, really. You’re not special, by the way. She does it with everyone. But she always comes back to me.”
Jesus Christ, so he also sees me as a threat.
And I’m alone with him.
Next to a forty-foot drop.
With a wild look in his eyes.
He starts to move to the side and back, and I turn to keep my eyes on him, realizing my error as he lifts the screwdriver in my direction and takes a step toward me. Without thinking, I take a step back, and then my knees hit the railing gently, and even with that, I can hear the creak. Now this man is before me, clearly threatening me, and my back is to a railing that wouldn’t take much for me to fall over.
I shore up my stance, trying to prepare myself. My eyes move from his face to the screwdriver in his hand and back as I try to make a concrete plan that won’t end in my falling off a forty-footcliff, and I decide that, from the look on his face, I can probably take him. I just need to get that fucking screwdriver away from him.
