Page 1 of The Naughty List
1
HOLLIS
ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS IS YOU
Lady in red, is dancing with me. Cheek to cheek.
The song plays softly overhead, outdated and out of place in the sleek, modern downtown building that’s home to the offices of The Wildlife Defense Alliance. It brings to mind my bold, uncharacteristic outfit choice. Crimson and black tweed knee-length pencil skirt and a sheer white wrap top that dips low in the front might have been a little more of a statement than I’d meant to make at today’s job interview.
Not to mention the shiny red stilettos that are currently pinching my pinky toes to death.
Freaking Addison.
My sister-in-law likes to push me out of my comfort zone regularly. Though I’d be lying if I said the president and founder of the WDA wasn’t part of my motivation for letting her this time.
Jonah X is an enigma.
Four years ago, at twenty-three and at the peak of his UFC fighting career, he went off the grid. Disappeared without a trace for eighteen months.
“Finding purpose in the chaos,” he’d said.
People on social media joked that he’d obviously taken too many shots to the head. He’d had millions of potential dollars coming from endorsements and movie deals. But he’d walked away from all of it.
What he found—while hiking across the most remote parts of the planet like a lumberjack with a death wish—was several endangered species being hunted and tortured for various reasons. Sport, their fur, or just because they happened to be unfortunate enough to inhabit areas where large corporations wanted to build or drill.
He returned home to Boston last year and founded the Wildlife Defense Alliance, which had become a pretty impressive and powerful company in a short time.
When I saw the online ad for an available receptionist position during my endless employment search, I applied immediately.
As did apparently every other woman ages eighteen to one hundred judging from the crowd in the lobby.
I need this job. At twenty-two I’m still living at home with my parents. And yes, it’s as horrible as it sounds.
After graduating high school, there was no money for me to go to college and my grades weren’t impressive enough for a substantial scholarship. I waited tables at my family’s bar until I turned twenty-one. Now I bartend, but I still make just a little over minimum wage.
So far this year I’ve interviewed to be a nanny, a court reporter, and a pharmaceutical sales rep.
They all say the same thing: I need more experience.
How in the world am I supposed to gain experience if no one will hire me without it? Needless to say, my options haven’t been stellar.
I do my best not to chew on my fingernails as I wait my turn, telling myself that Jonah X probably isn’t even here today. He’s most likely just a figurehead for the non-profit. I doubt he’s involved with the day-to-day operations.
But some small voice inside me, the one that sounds a lot like my sister-in-law, convinced me to wear this outfit in hopes that he would be.
“Ms. Rossi?” A ginger-haired woman with librarian glasses calls out from where she stands with a clipboard. “Holly Rossi?”
I stand and maneuver around the legs of the other waiting applicants, cursing Addi’s heels under my breath.
“Um, it’s Hollis, actually,” I say once I’ve reached her. “Hollis not Holly. Lots of people make that mistake, though.”
Shut up, Hollis.
She narrows her eyes at me. “I’m Elaine Irving, head of HR. Right this way, please.”
She doesn’t shake my hand, just turns and begins walking in the opposite direction. We take an elevator in awkward silence to the fourteenth floor.
Once we step out of it, she continues her speedy forward motion. She’s managing in her heels much better than I am so I break into a less than graceful gazelle stride to catch up.
