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  Well, this was a strange start. But what if critters were nocturnal and slept during the day? Wouldn’t it be wonderful to find the critter in the first few minutes? She knew she was grasping at straws and didn’t want to go beyond the reception area into this cold, scary place if she could avoid it because she didn’t want to use the flaky Cuckoo spell. She wanted to yell, “It’s the receptionist,” and run.

  “Um. Hello?” No response. She cleared her throat noisily. The receptionist shifted in her seat, gave a snort, and began to snore softly.

  “May I help you?” The question came from directly behind her, wrapped in a cold, deeply indifferent voice.

  Astral was sure she leapt about a foot in the air. She spun around to find the most startling, most imposing woman she had ever met. This stranger made Magdalene Curdle look like a short glass of tepid milk. She had to be at least six-foot-something. Her hair was as black as coal and cut with clinical precision to brush her shoulders and not one millimetre more. She had a keenly intelligent, though gaunt face, and her complexion, while tan in tone, seemed waxy instead of wholesome. She looked tired, irritable, and vaguely dangerous. Even the sensuous tilt to her sooty-lashed eyes did little to entice. She stared at Astral with a gaze as soulless as a shark’s. If she smiled, Astral guessed her teeth would be pearly white and pointed.

  Astral tripped backwards and slammed against the reception counter, rattling the chrome calendar stand. She masked her wince. The sleeping beauty behind the desk snored on, undisturbed.

  “Hi. Um…hi, it’s my first day and…um…” She internally lunged for her Mindcoddle mantra. I am but a simple girl. I am but a simp—

  The stranger looked like she ate simple girls for breakfast. Astral’s mantra snapped shut.

  “Um…” She could hear the plaintive bleat in her voice, a lonesome sheep on a hilltop.

  Impatience seethed under the crisply tailored business suit, which was as sharp and impeccably cut as its owner’s bone structure. “Are you Ms Projector?” The question was as hard as her stare.

  Astral managed a nod.

  “You’re in my department, then. Floor thirteen. Ms Ping—” she nodded at the sleeping girl— “will bring your papers later. Follow me, please.”

  With no further introduction, she strode off towards the bank of elevators. Astral hesitated for a moment before chasing after her across the foyer.

  Inside the elevator car, Astral’s fidgeting reflection gawped back at her threefold from the mirrored walls. The Stylistics’ “Hey There Lonely Girl” on jazz harmonica playing softly through a hidden speaker did little to relax, as she was cowed and overheated in the small space, and she shrank into a corner like a frightened mouse. Air itched in her throat, thick and hot, as if the elevator were descending into the fiery pits of hell and not up a few floors. Any notion of small talk was squished by a sly sideways glance at her companion. The hawk-like profile condemned her to silence. Not that Astral could peel her tongue off the roof of her mouth anyway. Everything about this woman broadcast hostility, scariness, and, quite frankly, crittery-ness. She just knew she was in this elevator with a critter. Her job was done and she could go home, now. If she wasn’t eaten first.

  With a ding, the doors opened and Astral practically fell onto the thirteenth floor. Relief and cool, breathable air washed over her. It was degrees cooler in the open office, though her face still stung with embarrassment.

  “You’re with the Compliance team.” The woman pointed to a group of nearby desks. “Mister Mor will show you around. He’s your team lead.” A small, rotund man came scuttling their way. Before he reached them, the woman stalked away, leaving Astral to make her own introductions.

  “Good morning, um, Mister Mor?”

  “Ms Projector is it? Sure, isn’t it great to meet ye,” he said in a thick Irish brogue, and held out a warm, calloused hand. He was no taller than Astral, balding on top with an encircling crown of bright red hair. He wore small, gold- rimmed spectacles, and sported Dickensian mutton-chop sideburns. It was hard to guess his age, but going by his dress sense, which was funky in a trendy Edwardian gentleman way—all tweeds and plaids—she guessed him to be in his mid-thirties, and extremely style-conscious. The gold watch chain that stretched across his waistcoat and tub of a belly indicated a meticulous eye for detail. Heavy gold rings with old family crests adorned both pinkie fingers and when he smiled, the twinkle of a gold-capped incisor winked cheerfully at her. He sported the most polished shoes Astral had ever seen, and the overhead lighting beamed off his punched-leather toecaps.

  “Please, call me Astral.” Her teeth rattled with the force of his handshake.

  “And I’m Fergal. Fergal Mor. I see you’ve already met the boss.” His tone was as vigorous as his handshake.

  “Oh? I didn’t know.” Astral was hardly surprised to hear that her elevator companion was the head honcho. The frosty demeanour had said it all. “We only shared the lift up,” she said.

  “Ms Black is the director of operations.”

  “Is she one of the Black and Blacker Blacks?” If she’d been around awhile, she’d hardly be the critter, though secretly, Astral wished she was. Wouldn’t that be delicious?

  “Yes,” Fergal said. “One of the Blacks, not a Blacker. Her great-great grandfather was a founding member. It’s still a family-run firm, though you seldom see any of the Blackers these days.”

  So, Ms Black was cold and rude for natural reasons, not supernatural ones. Privilege was a wonderful thing for rotting someone from the inside out. How disappointing. She would have liked Ms Charmless to be the critter. It would have been interesting to watch Magdalene and her cronies face off against Ms Black’s personal brand of ruthless elitism.

  “This is your desk.” Fergal indicated an empty desk near the window, not far from the elevators. It was a busy, exposed spot and probably the least favoured desk on the entire floor, but she was pleased with her allotted seat. She was in the corner, close to the water cooler with her back against the wall. It gave her a full view of the floor, so she could keep an eye on who came and went, and had proximity to the gossip hotspot. Everyone prattled around the water cooler. Hopefully, she would be able to see and hear everything without moving far from her desk or the exit. She already had a plan on how to make inroads into the second-best hotspot, the kitchen.

  “So, Compliance is a small team. There’s only you and me for the moment. The rest are in transition from London. You’re here to cover for…for…” He screwed up his rosy button of a nose trying to remember. “Well, her name eludes me now, but you’re here to cover whatshername’s maternity leave.”

  Astral nodded with a twinge of guilt. The Cuckoo spell gave the illusion of a magicked maternity leave for an employee who never was. Erratic, nebulous magic that could fray in an instant. She was walking a razor’s edge without a safety net and she desperately hoped the spell would hold long enough for her to find the critter and beat an exit. She had five days maximum to deliver.

  Fergal gabbled on, explaining this and that in a ricochet of words and choppy hand actions. “The ladies’ washroom is three doors down, next to the stationery store and to the right of the kitchen. Ms Ping will show you around proper when she turns up.”

  “I saw her in the foyer,” Astral volunteered. “She was sleeping behind the reception desk.” She stopped, worried she had welched on the young receptionist, but really, blatantly sleeping on the job and in front of Ms Black. Surely, it had to be some sort of self-destruct thing. Fergal’s reply surprised her.

  “Ach. Poor wee thing had to work last night. She must have been fearful busy to fall asleep so early in the day.”

  “Oh, dear.” The receptionist must be getting paid buttons if she had to hold down two jobs. Astral had sympathy for her plight. She often struggled to make an honest wage herself. Magic was all very well, but the coven’s code meant witches were expected to earn their living, not conjure up self-serving magic. Her interest in Ms Ping piqued. She also lik
ed that Fergal was supportive towards his beleaguered colleague. Her interest in Ms Black might have gone up a little, too, because she didn’t seem to penalize her sleeping receptionist, which struck her as odd, given her initial impression.

  “Sure, she’ll be along soon enough with your papers and work pass.” He whipped a gold watch from his waistcoat pocket with a flourish. “Ah-ha, I have a meeting now. I’ll be about an hour. When I get back, we’ll go through your workload, all right?”

  “Sure.” Astral shrugged off her coat. “I can find my way around.”

  “In the meantime, read those.” He pointed to a pile of papers on her desk. “They’re the latest default contracts. All the usual stuff, but can you cross-reference them with these dissolution documents?” He handed her a folder. “Oh, feel free to help yourself to tea and coffee from the kitchen.”

  “Will do,” Astral assured his retreating back. He jingled away, whistling in tune to the loose change in his trouser pockets. Too cheerful to be a critter, it seemed.

  She hung her jacket on a nearby coat rack and surveyed the office, constructed in a large and open plan. It had filled up over the last half hour to become a flurry of activity. The hustle and bustle had the right sort of energy. Busy but not too rushed or frenetic. People had time to talk and smile at each other, and that pleased her because it would make her job much easier. A mean-minded critter would stick out a mile in a place like this.

  Meanwhile, coffee sounded good. It would give her a chance to check out the kitchen before Ms Ping appeared with her security details and work pass. Until then, she couldn’t log onto her swanky computer anyway. That pleased her, too. As a temp worker, she was used to having the most beat-up equipment in the office foisted upon her. This computer looked brand new.

  So, perhaps Ms Black wasn’t as much of an ogre as she had first thought, since there was new equipment even for temps, and people seemed relaxed and happy and stopped to chat. Still, first impressions were difficult to overcome. She’d make sure to steer clear of the company’s director of operations, who didn’t seem to miss much, if anything.

  She removed a Tupperware container from her bag and set off for the kitchen. Experience had proved that the best way to integrate into a new office was to bring along home baking. It always led to happy coworkers, and then the swapping of recipes, which generally led to office gossip. Sugar always loosened tongues. She walked down the corridor, carefully counting doors as she went. One, two, three doors down. Next to the stationery store? And was that to the right or left of the kitchen? She opened the door and sailed straight into Ms Black’s office.

  Clearly, it was not to the left.

  Through her shock, she registered that entering Ms Black’s office was like stepping into a Dickens novel. Her new boss sat behind a huge ebony desk bedecked with an ugly oversized onyx inkwell complete with quills, an elaborate jade cigar box, and a mountain of leather-bound ledgers. The entire room seemed locked in a bizarre time warp compared to the techno swish of the outer office.

  And from this vantage point, it was impossible not to stare at everything in the gloomy office. It somehow matched the woman sitting ramrod straight behind the acre of desktop, her back resolutely turned away from the window and its fine views. On either side of her loomed bookshelves with row after row of ledgers, all with morose, black spines and gilt lettering. The library of the damned, Astral was sure.

  “Oh. I’m…I’m so sorry. I miscounted.” She stammered an apology and backed away, something she already had a habit of doing with Ms Black, and she admired herself for such wisdom.

  “Miscounted?” Ms Black’s question focused her attention back on the desk and its occupant.

  Astral’s shoulders hit the wall. While in reverse she had somehow missed the doorway entirely. Did Ms Black do it deliberately? Was she aware how disorientating her sloe-eyed stare was?

  “Um, the doors. I miscounted the doors.” Could she sound any sillier? “I was looking for the kitchen. I thought I’d…um…get a coffee before I started on the paperwork that…um…Fergal left.” She got a coolly calculating stare in response. “For me. I mean he left paperwork for me. He didn’t just leave.” She has to be the critter. Regardless of what Ms Black’s great-great grandfather did, she had to be the evil critter. She should run. No, hide. No, run. Or Mindcoddle.

  “I am but a simple girl.”

  “Excuse me?” Ms Black’s frown deepened.

  Oh, fart. She had said it out loud. Astral gave the Tupperware box a feeble shake, trying to deflect. “Would you like a fudge melt? I made them myself.”

  “You bet,” a voice sang out by her shoulder, startling Astral enough that the contents of the Tupperware hit the lid and thumped back down again. The fudge melts would be in bits, she thought ruefully, then turned her attention to the cheerful newcomer. Ms Ping from the reception desk stood beside her, fully awake, mischief-eyed, and smiling brightly. It was such a relief to encounter a friendly face after the intensity of Ms Black’s glare that Astral smiled back.

  “Ms Ping, please show Ms Projector the way to the kitchen,” Ms Black snapped. “Apparently, she has trouble counting.” With that, she returned to her work, effectively dismissing them both.

  “Follow me,” Ms Ping whispered, and grabbed Astral by the elbow to whisk her out of the office as fast as possible. “I’m Ping, by the way, forget the Ms. only Abby uses it.”

  “Abby? Ms Black?” She sure as Hecate didn’t look like an Abby. She looked like a mean-minded critter. And she was going to figure out how to prove it.

  Ping nodded at the closed door. “Abby is the boss lady and I’m the fetch-all, do-all, gofer around here, if you hadn’t already guessed. Great idea, by the way.” She tapped the Tupperware. “Except Abby doesn’t have a sweet tooth.”

  Astral sagged with relief to be out in the corridor again. Even the air tasted different away from Abby Black’s office, lighter and somehow more refreshing.

  “She doesn’t have a sweet anything,” Ping continued. She giggled and Astral found herself joining in on a conspiratorial level. “She’s not as bad as she looks, though,” Ping continued. “I’ve worked for her since leaving college, nearly five years. She’s great to work for. A bit wound up, but dynamite at her job.”

  A bit wound up might be an understatement, but the fact that this vivacious, spritely woman had been working for someone like Abby Black for five years was a little confusing, given her own fleeting experiences with the boss lady’s demeanour. Also, five years did not sound like a critter situation. The critter was supposed to be new to the area, and perhaps even to the company. Critters were invasive creatures. They snuck in, did their wormy worst, and snuck back out again, leaving chaos in their wake. Black and Blacker was an old, family-run firm, and most of the staff here seemed to have some tenure. Astral needed to check out the newer employees. That’s where she should start.

  “So, you came down from London, then,” she said. “That must have taken an effort.”

  Ping rolled her eyes expressively. “You have no idea. We’re still unpacking.”

  “Did everyone want to move?”

  “Mostly. Any gaps will be filled by temps like you. Hey.” Ping looked at her in earnest. “They’ll be looking for new staff soon. I mean, if you’re interested, and you like it here, of course.” She pushed open the door to the kitchen and headed straight to the coffeepot. “I need a gallon of this today if I’m to keep my eyes open.”

  “Fergal said you work nights, too,” Astral said, letting the earlier comment about permanent work go. In less than a week, she wouldn’t even be a memory to Ping.

  “It’s not every night, just most nights.”

  “What do you do?”

  “Work for Ms Black, of course.” She began prepping two cups. “Milk? Sugar?”

  “Cream, if you have it, and four spoons of sugar, please. So, you do a night shift here, and then a day job? That can’t be right. Can you legally do all those hours? I’d keel over.�
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  Ping heaped five spoons of sugar into her own cup. “It’s part of my job description. I do split shifts and I’m expected to work a few nights. If I weren’t settling in this pesky new start, I’d be home in bed right now.” She grinned. “I had to hang on to meet and greet you. Not that I did a very good job of it. Sorry.” She handed Astral her coffee and helped herself to several fudge melts that had survived their Tupperware shake-up. Ping bit cheerfully into one. “These are yum. I have such a sweet tooth.”

  “Me, too.” Astral took a cake for herself. “I’m sorry I caused you extra work this morning.”

  “Well, you didn’t really, did you? I mean, I fell asleep anyway and Fergal had to collect you. Plus, I also managed to lose your agency paperwork, can you believe it? I’m such a mess, I can’t recall where I put it, or even seeing it before. It’s weird. I knew you were turning up, but for the life of me, I can’t remember a thing about organizing a temp.”

  “That busy, eh?” Of course, Ping would think the paperwork was misplaced. It never existed in the first place. “And it was Ms Black who brought me up from reception, not Fergal.”

  “Lucky old you. She does make an unsettling first impression. But it’s not all bite. Oops.” Ping’s smile suddenly slid away as a tall, blonde woman appeared in the doorway and drifted past them to the coffee maker. She was stunning. As beautiful, angular, and elegant as any catwalk model. She moved ethereally, like the velvet smoke of an opium pipe. She even poured coffee as if on a photo shoot in Versace’s kitchen. And then she wafted out, cup in hand, ignoring them both completely.