Page 68 of A World Apart (Between Worlds #1)

“Becka chill,” I slid a glass of wine across the countertop to her. I was already on my second one.

“CHILL!?” she screeched again as she snatched the glass of red, taking a gulp I would have choked on, for sure.

Coming up for air, she panted as she said, “How are you so calm? What the fuck are you gonna do? They FIRED you! ”

“Technically, I resigned.” I held up my hand to pause Becka’s oncoming barrage. “Drink your wine and I’ll tell you all about it,” I soothed.

Eying me, she raised the glass to her mouth, but only sipped at it this time.

“Okay, so there I was, trying to peel Jeremy’s head off his desk when Celine comes in, looking mad as a bag of cats.

‘You,’” I said, doing my best Celine impression by holding my nose to emulate her nasally voice, “‘follow me.’ So, all three of us go back to the scene of the crime, only Jihoon, Youngsoo, and TK are gone.

“We all sit down and then Liam Fenway comes in, looking pissed as hell.”

Becka gasped. “The Chief Operations Officer? He never comes in, not for anything!”

“Lucky me then, because this is the first and last time I’ll ever see him,” I chuckled, taking a swig of wine.

“Kaiya,” Becka groaned, “be so for real right now.”

I waved her off. “Anyway, so Celine starts in, treating the whole thing like a witch trial and I’m the harlot accused of casting seduction spells on the men of the town. Meanwhile, Jeremy is sat there with his head in his hands.”

“What does Liam do?” Becka asks through bloodless lips.

“He’s just sat there with his hands like this,” I lean my elbows on the counter and steeple my fingers together, “like he’s one of the businessmen on Shark Tank.

“Eventually he tells Celine to shut her beak and asks me what happened, like anything I say at this point is going to make a difference.” I made a ‘pfft’ sound and sip my wine.

“What did you say?”

“I told them the truth.” I shrugged. Becka groaned and put her head down on the counter. Lot of people doing that today.

“Liam asked how long I’d been seeing Jihoon, I told him the truth. I mean, two people literally caught us in the act, what was the point of lying?” I forced a devil-may-care smirk on to my face, but I couldn’t force the nervous jitters away as they still coursed through my body.

“Oh babes…” Becka’s eyes started welling up as she looked at me.

“Becka, it’s okay. I was going to be leaving in a few months anyway, this just… accelerated things.”

“But they let you resign? ”

“Yes,” I jumped on the sideways topic before I thought too much about the rug that had been pulled out from under my feet, three months early.

“Liam was all about to kick me out, but Jeremy piped up to argue that considering I’m not a US citizen, that would be terrible for me as I wasn’t entitled to claim unemployment and I’d have to leave the country sooner than I planned. ” I took a fortifying gulp of wine.

“He convinced him to let me resign so I wouldn’t have the black mark against my employment record back in the UK. I think he sold it on the basis that it would be less paperwork for the studio.”

“And he bought that?” Becka's eyebrows shot up so high, they almost touched her hairline.

“Well,” I hedged, a nervous smile pulling up my lips. “Not at first.”

Becka blinked. “At first?”

“Did I mention that TK was also in that meeting?” I took a generous gulp of wine.

Becka frowned. “Why the fuck was he there? What’s he got to do with anything?”

I shrugged. “He seems to feel entitled to do a lot of things he has no business to,” I said darkly. “Anyway, so then TK pipes up, spewing some absolute crap about the studio’s reputation and suing me for-”

“SUING YOU!?” Becka screeched so loud I almost dropped my wine glass.

“Ow, ears!” I cried, trying to steady the hand holding my glass to prevent any wine sloshing out.

“Sorry,” she said contritely, a hand held to her mouth. “Then what happened?”

"So TK launches into this disappointed mentor routine, going on about how suing me is the only way to protect the studio's reputation and make an example of me ? yada, yada." I gestured with my hand and rolled my eyes.

“Oh, fuck, Ky… what did you do?”

“Pfft. I pulled out my phone.”

“You-you did what?” Becka frowned, cocking her head to the side as I just grinned.

“I put my phone on the side like this ?” I pulled my phone out of my pocket and put it on the counter, where Becka looked at it with a blank expression .

“And then I pressed play, like this.” I slid my finger up the screen and played the audio recording, Trevor Kyle’s voice filling our small kitchenette.

“ It’s Kaiya. What can I do for you, Mr Kyle?”

“How long have you worked for us, Kaiya?”

“Since April, Mr Kyle.”

“And do you have aspirations to work in the music industry, Kaiya?”

“I don’t know career I’m going to pursue, yet.”

“I could help you with that, you know. It’s so important to nurture talent from within our ranks. I’ve seen your Youtube channel. You have some promise.”

“T-thank you.”

“Why don’t you spend some time shadowing me? I could show you the ropes. I’d be happy to break you in a little bit.”

“It’s who you know in this business that opens doors. You need friends you can look up to. We could be friends.”

“When did that happen?” Becka is so pale I’m worried she’ll faint.

“Sit down.” I pulled out the chair at the counter and helped her into it.

“Ky, why didn’t you tell me?” Her chin trembled, and I can’t help but wonder if perhaps I should have done.

I shrugged. “It was weeks ago and what would I have said? ‘TK made more gross passes at me’? I was trying to focus on just being present here, at Pisces, in LA… It seemed immaterial.”

“Immaterial,” Becka murmured through bloodless lips. “Did he touch you?”

“What? No!” I insisted. “Donna came in and interrupted him.”

“Donna hates everyone ? but she sticks her neck out for you.” Becka started to giggle, but it was a strained sound. “What the fuck is it about you?” Becka threw her hands up in the air. “An idol, a producer, and now the world’s most dangerous receptionist.”

“I’m not sure how I feel about all those people being lumped together,” I reflected.

Becka closed her eyes, pinched the bridge of her nose and took a deep breath in. “Okay, tell me what happened next in the meeting.”

“Oh, yeah. Well, as you can imagine, TK blew his top.” I grinned.

“He tried to grab my phone, but Jeremy pulled it away before he could reach it. Very dramatic.” I waggled my eyebrows at Becka, who just took a gulp of wine.

“Then, TK tried to downplay it. ‘That’s bullshit.’ He said, ‘that recording doesn’t prove any wrongdoing.

’ But he looked nervous as hell.” I chuckled.

“I just said, ‘maybe not legally, but I wonder what the court of public opinion would think.’”

“Oh, holy fuck,” Becka groaned.

“So then he tried to throw the non-disclosure agreement in my face,” I added, “but that’s when Liam Fenway pipes up to point out that the NDA only protects clients, not ‘dumbass producers.’ Honestly, Becka, you should have seen TK’s face.

It was glorious.” I sighed, leaning back against the counter and taking another sip of wine.

Becka gulped her wine like water, grabbed the bottle, and poured herself another. She held it up silently, asking if I needed a top-up. I held out my glass, and she poured in the rest, the bottle now empty.

“What happened then?”

“Not much. TK stormed out, Fenway told Celine to get my paperwork printed and then he just told Jeremy to finalise the ‘exit interview.’” I huffed and then took another sip form my glass.

Silence fell between us as we each collected our thoughts.

“So you’ve officially ‘resigned’?” Becka asked eventually, a crease between her brows.

“Technically,” I agreed, “Jeremy even told me afterwards that if I ever needed a reference, to email him directly and he’ll do it for me. Damn good of him.”

“He may be on the verge of a stroke, but he’s a decent person,” Becka agreed.

“How are you feeling? That was a lot, babes.” Becka held my gaze, that unnerving stare she sometimes pulled out when she knew you were withholding something. I fidgeted, playing with my ring as I considered my answer.

“Honestly, I’m kind of relieved. The whole thing with TK was more of a weight than I thought – and yes, you’re absolutely right, I should have told you.”

“Why didn’t you?”

I chewed on my lip before answering. “I was so busy trying to convince myself it wasn’t a big deal, that I think I convinced myself it wasn’t .

“I mean, who the hell am I?” I spread my arms. “Just a foreigner in a country that isn’t all that interested in keeping me here without the backing of my employer. An employer I would be potentially implicating in a sexual harassment scandal.

“So, yes. Relief is the thing I mostly feel. And I think I didn’t tell you because you’ve been so invested in me, and my time here.

And I’ve been feeling like an arsehole for not being more into it.

You went to so much trouble to get me here and put me up.

And it only took me a few months to realise I didn’t want this anymore. ”

I was so worked up, that I almost didn’t realise what I’d just said, until Becka held up her hand to pause me.

“Hold up – what did you realise you don’t want anymore?”

Ah fuck. Oh well, in for a penny, in for a pound.

I sighed. “Becka I… being here has been such an enormous, wild adventure, and I really mean it when I say that I have loved it. But of all the things I’ve learnt since being here, the biggest is that… I don’t want to do music production. It’s just not something I love anymore.”

I fell silent and just watched her, watching me. Until she blew out a breath, dropped her head and said, “Finally.”

Not the response I was expecting. “Beg pardon?”