Unraveled (Jersey Girls Book 1) Read online

  Unraveled

  Lisa-Marie Cabrelli

  Contents

  Foreword

  1. Claire

  2. Satish

  3. Claire

  4. Satish

  5. Claire

  6. Satish

  7. Claire

  8. Satish

  9. Claire

  10. Satish

  11. Claire

  12. Satish

  13. Claire

  14. Satish

  15. Claire

  16. Satish

  17. Claire

  18. Satish

  19. Claire

  20. Satish

  21. Claire

  22. Satish

  23. Claire

  24. Satish

  25. Claire

  26. Satish

  27. Claire

  28. Satish

  29. Claire

  30. Satish

  31. Claire

  32. Satish

  33. Claire

  34. Satish

  35. Claire

  36. Satish

  37. Claire

  38. Satish

  39. Claire

  40. Satish

  41. Claire

  42. Nandita

  43. Claire

  44. Satish

  45. Claire

  46. Claire

  47. Claire

  48. Claire & Satish

  49. Lit Chicks

  50. Unstoppable - Dumped!

  51. Unstoppable - Reckoning

  Also by the Author

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Foreword

  Join the Lit Chicks

  Members of Lisa-Marie’s Lit Chicks get free books, early access to new novels, behind the scenes bonus stories and more..

  See the back of the book for information on how to join for free.

  1

  Claire

  “Shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot,” groaned Claire as she stared at the message in her email inbox. She would have said “Shit” but only yesterday she had promised Dad that she would be more ladylike after he caught her calling one of her workmates a “royal bitch” on the phone.

  “I don’t know where you learn language like that, Claire,” he had said, “I’m sure it’s the influence of living in a place like Hoboken.”

  Her dad says the word Hoboken like it is some sick new doll release from Mattel. After Barbie had dumped him for the 50th time, he resorted to drugs. Heroin has destroyed him and now he lives on the streets begging for change--introducing the new “Hobo Ken.”

  “Uh oh - dirty talk from Claire, it must be serious. What’s going down?” Sally poked her head over the wall of Claire’s cube.

  “Urgent meeting with Nick” Claire thumped her head down on to her desk and took a few deep breaths to quell her nausea. She had to stop going out on weeknights. She was thinking it might be a good idea just to take a nap right there on her desk, but a sharp pain in her right cheekbone made her raise her head. She turned miserably to her best friend. A pen cap dangled, wobbled, and then dropped from where it had embedded in her cheek.

  “Great! Not only am I going to have alcohol breath, but a lovely pen cap indentation to offset my bloodshot eyes! Why Sally, why today of all days?”

  Sally grimaced, but Claire could see she was trying not to laugh. “Oh, Claire that sucks… sorry! Did you just get summoned?”.

  “Yes,” Claire said and pointed to her computer screen.

  Please see me immediately in my office. It’s urgent. Nick

  Nick the Dick. Now, what would Dad think of that name? Especially given that she was a “young professional” – as Dad put it. Young professional she may be, but she was becoming disillusioned with being a professional at all. If she hadn’t had “the plan” in place for 13 years, she would have re-examined this job two months ago.

  She considered how her social life wasn’t much better. She had a huge crowd of acquaintances that kept every free hour busy, but her only friend was Sally. A large group would pile out of the office at 5:00 pm and head straight over to Happy Hour at The Green Knoll. Claire had nothing in common with any of them. Sally flirted with all the junior salesmen and relished all the juicy gossip. Claire sat in the corner and waited until she could lure Sally away. Sally was Claire’s roommate as well as her only friend. Eventually, after Claire sent enough pleading looks in her direction, Sally would flirt her way into a ride to the train station. They would jump, or in Sally's case fall into, the train back to Hoboken for dinner at one of their many favorite restaurants. If they were responsible they would go home after that. If they weren’t, they would head up to Maxwell’s to dance. Frankly, the whole thing was getting a little old.

  Claire rubbed her temples and reminded herself of “the plan.” Five years. Five years in this corporate hell would earn her enough to start her clothing line, open a little boutique, and live the life she was meant to be living. Only Sally knew what happened to Claire when she sat in front of a sewing machine or got a needle in her hand – she was lost to the world. A major part of the plan was to use every spare minute she had sewing and preparing - it didn’t seem to be working out that way. Unfortunately Sally, and she was aware of this fact, was not the most supportive of roommates. Sitting in front of a sewing machine meant less time out on the town and less time looking for Sally’s perfect mate. Sally was sure he was out there somewhere amongst the Fahrenheit-scented suits crowding the sidewalks of Washington Street. Claire wasn’t buying it – the suits were empty – and she couldn't believe that Sally hadn’t learned that by experience.

  “What do you think he wants?” Sally asked, rousing Claire back to her sad reality.

  “I’m sure he wants to tell me, yet again, how he likes his administrative staff to be very professional looking--and aren’t skirt suits more professional on a woman than pantsuits?”

  Three months ago Sally had flung herself into their Hoboken apartment with such drama that the slamming door made Claire jump violently. She shoved too much fabric through the machine, broke her needle in half and turned to Sally with a dirty look.

  “There’s a job Claire! And it’s perfect for you!”, Sally crowed.

  Sally’s mom was a District Manager at Telco. When Sally graduated from Rutgers (barely) with a degree in business, it was a no-brainer that her mom would slot her into a management position. A few weeks after graduation Sally appeared on Claire’s dad's doorstep at 6:30 pm dressed in a burgundy Ann Taylor suit and snakeskin heels waving a check above her head in triumph. She instructed Claire to pack her things - they were moving to Hoboken. Sally had found an awesome--a questionable use of the word--apartment and would cover expenses until Claire could pay her back. Claire had been in Hoboken a week, trying to get a restaurant job with no experience and a degree in fashion, when Sally slammed the door and broke the needle.

  “Mom got you an interview! Right time, right place, Claire”, she gushed. “You’ll ace the interview of course, and if they offer it to you-you need to grab it.”

  Claire wasn’t sure that she was equipped for the corporate life, but her debt to Sally was piling up, and of course there was, “the plan.” A corporate job paid a lot more than waiting tables.

  What Sally hadn’t told Claire was that the reason this job went out for external hire (a rarity) was that none of the current secretaries would even interview because the boss was such a creep.

  Yes… Nick the Dick.

  The first few weeks weren’t so bad. Nick was away so although Claire heard rumors (some that made her wince with embarrassment) she was blessedly ignorant and naïve to the extent of his dickishness.

  “No one could
be that bad,” Claire had thought to herself. After the fourth week, Claire was starting to doubt Sally’s status as her best friend.

  “Why didn’t you tell me to run from this job screaming like a banshee,” Claire whispered to Sally the day of his return. She had made three trips to his office, and he had had three conversations with her breasts.

  “Who would I ride the train with if you didn’t work here Claire?”, Sally whined, “Stick it out. He’ll give up eventually.”

  “Well you’re a shitty pimp Sal. You could have at least got me more money if you were selling my body.”

  Claire had endured the following:

  Many, many conversations with her breasts. She daily fought the urge to put her hand under Nick’s chin and raise his eyes to hers.

  Loud summons (so the whole office could hear it seemed) of “Honey, Bunny… where is that little thing when you need her?”

  Backrubs in her cube when she least expected. Even her constant brushoffs of, “Thanks Nick, I’m not tense” didn’t help reduce the frequency.

  A lunch meeting he summoned her to attend and “take minutes” at Hooters. She was unable to record most of the minutes as most of the meeting was made up of discussions on which waitresses most deserved to work there.

  She put up with it all because it was part of her plan. Five years was all she needed.

  Claire approached Nick’s office and could hear him from outside his closed door. His voice, as usual, was ten decibels above the level of a jackhammer.

  “Well, I told her I didn’t want to hear any of that crap. Tired from looking after the kids? Please! I mean what’s so hard about that? I told her that if I wanted to go out for a drink after a hard day’s work, I would do it - and when I got home, I was not interested in babysitting three rowdy kids. “Girl’s Night Out” my ass. I mean what is that?”

  Charming. Claire knocked on the door and walked into the office. Nick was sitting with his back to her, phone cradled under one ear, hands on the keyboard of his computer with Fox News on the screen in front of him. At the sound of the knock, he swiveled around in his chair and swung his feet up onto his desk.

  “Honeybunny!”

  Claire gave a weak smile. Five years, five years, five years – her mantra, her personal om.

  “Frank gotta go. My girl just got here, and we got some business to take care, of if ya know what I mean.” He listened and then broke into guffaws, “You kill me, Frank!” The phone slammed back in the cradle.

  “Nick, I just got your…”

  “You are going to wish you got here sooner when you hear the news I got for you, babe,” Nick leaned across the desk, wagged his index finger in the air and managed to leer at Claire. Yes, leer. Claire didn’t even know that people could do that until she met Nick.

  Claire opened her spiral binder and pulled off the pen cap with her teeth. She bit hard, twisted and imagined it was Nick’s nose. "Payback’s a bitch," she told the pen cap in her head.

  “You don’t need your notebook right now, honey. I have good news for you!” Nick leaned forward.

  “What’s up, Nick?”, she pulled the chair back two feet from his desk and took a seat.

  “Well, darling – it turns out that a job has opened up on my team. Now I wouldn’t normally even consider an admin for a promotion so quickly. But you show a lot of promise, and you’ve taken reasonably good care of me so far, so I decided to take care of you. You scratch my back, I scratch yours, you know?"

  Claire looked at him confused. She wasn't qualified for a promotion. And the back scratching talk made her a little nervous. But he kept talking.

  "Here’s the deal, you know they started a new sales division for our Global Customers?"

  No, I didn't, Claire thought. I don't even know what a sales division is.

  "The VP and I were having a chat, and he mentioned he wanted an opportunity management tool for the group. I told him we would just give him the one we’ve got for the other sales group. I told him five weeks so don’t ask for any changes. I need to impress him and get it out the door quickly."

  What the hell was he talking about? He must be serious about what he was saying because he wasn't even trying to look down her top. But it meant nothing to her.

  "You’ll be the analyst – but all you have to do is rewrite the existing BRD with Global written on it and get it to IT. You can report directly to me on this one project and then we’ll see where to put you. No need to talk to anyone else about it."

  Talk to someone else? She had no idea what he was talking about? What was a BRD?

  "Try not to involve the VP over there; name’s Satish, he’s a busy guy. Phil Harley works for him, and he should be able to manage the project with you – I scheduled a meeting with you in his cube in fifteen minutes. Look him up and head over there.”

  He clicked his tongue and winked at her. “Like I said, babe – this is an excellent opportunity to show us your stuff. Now get out of here and go get ‘em!”

  Claire sat there and looked a Nick dumbfounded. It was the most Nick had said to her directly in three months of working for him - and she hadn’t understood a single word of it.

  “I sent it to you in an e-mail as well… Scooch,” Nick flicked at her with his hands.

  Claire stood and walked from the office, feeling as though she might just cry.

  OK, thought Claire as she headed back toward her cube, don’t panic! He couldn’t mean that he had promoted her after just three months at the company, could he? And he couldn’t mean that she had a meeting in fifteen minutes with a guy she had never met, in a department she had never been to, on a project that she had never heard of and most certainly didn’t understand.

  “Claire?” Sally was standing to dip into the candy jar on the top wall of her cube when she saw Claire storming towards her. “What on earth did he do this time?”

  “What’s an "Analyst" Sally? What’s a "BRD"?”

  Sally stared at her, ”Huh?”

  “He just promoted me, Sal. The dick just promoted me, and I have no freaking idea what he is talking about. None of it. This is a complete disaster! He will fire me if I screw this up and I need this job.”

  “Oh shit,” said Sally, “he is coming in hard!”

  “OK, now I have no idea what you are talking about! Did everyone start speaking a new language overnight because I feel like a foreigner right now.”

  “What exactly did he say, Claire?”

  “He said that it was an opportunity to show my stuff and then he said all that stuff about analysts and BRDs and that I have a meeting in fifteen minutes. Oh, and something about people not getting promoted this quickly and scratching his back – which I hope doesn’t mean that he expects me to give him back rubs now. Having him touch me is bad enough, but touching him would be a nightmare. What is Dad going to say? I’m doomed if I…”

  “Claire!” Sally threw a Hershey’s kiss at her and it bounced off her eyebrow. “You are losing it! Calm down, and we will think about this.” She put the lid back on the candy jar and chewed a kiss, her brow wrinkling. “OK, apparently he expects something in return, so you will just have to sabotage this job. He can’t keep you in the job if you suck and he can’t expect anything if you don’t keep the promotion.”

  “That's the craziest idea ever, Sal. If I screw up surely he will just fire me. What do you think he expects?”

  “You scratch my back; I’ll scratch yours… are you blind! Don’t be so naïve Claire. You had better screw this job up and screw it up now!”

  “That won’t be a problem since I have absolutely no idea what he is talking about! What a….. dick! Get me the room number of Phil Harley. Damn it!”

  2

  Satish

  Satish Bhatt sat in front of his email frowning at the last message from his baby sister Nandita. She sounded a little frantic, and that sent his anxiety meter soaring. He loved his sister. She was the only person in his family that talked to him about life, and not just about mo
ney and responsibility and weddings.

  Damn weddings. Satish had married off three of his four sisters in the last eight years which had meant every trip to India, and every moment of his vacation spent planning and attending weddings. He didn’t regret it. His parents had made good matches for his sisters to the right husbands in good families. Satish himself had fulfilled his duties to the family by providing his parents with the funds to offer a healthy, yet reasonable, dowry for each of them. His family’s status in the small city in India in which they lived had increased dramatically. This status guaranteed some profitable business deals for his father’s textile business. It also sealed relationships with some of the most well-regarded families in the community.

  The only sister left unwed was the youngest, Nandita, and she was proving a little more complicated than the others. Nandita had fallen in love – and not with the man their parents had chosen.

  Satish read the note again and smiled in spite of his anxiety; his little sister had grown up full of fire.

  Father has told me that I must spend the evening hours at home. I am no longer permitted to walk home from school with my friends, and I am no longer able to visit Jaya after dinner. Satish, if I don’t visit Jaya, I won’t see Sachin. Sachin says he could not stand it if Father were to keep us apart and Jaya says her brother has been begging his parents to approach Father about a match. I heard Father telling Mother that we must maintain the match planned for me. Oh Satish, I think I will scream if Father tells me one more time of the excellent qualities of his cousin. I don’t want to marry Naveen. I have never even met him. I want to marry Sachin. I can’t imagine Sachin and I not being together and neither can he. We love each other and is that not the most important thing in a marriage? I told Father that I wanted to hold off on marrying for now and go to University. Satish, he got as angry as I have ever seen him. He said no daughter of his would ruin her marriage opportunities with an education. That’s when he told me I had to stay home from now on. You are so lucky to be in America living far away from here.