Page 52 of Manhattan State of Mind

They’ve stopped working completely to stare at me. Phones ring off the hook, ignored.

I’m frozen in place, bits out, while I scream wordlessly at them to answer the goddamn phones. But not a squeak emerges.

Wait… hold up.

It’s my alarm.

I awake with a start, sheets twisted and drenched. Oh, thank goodness. Just another bizarre dream.

About Wolfe, no less. Interesting.

I can’t stop dwelling on that odd run-in with him yesterday. His words were kind of sweet, but his face? Might as well have been chiseled from granite. At least I know now he didn’t push me.

The man is an enigma and talking to him fills me with anxiety. Chatting with people I know is fine with this amnesia malarkey, but my clearest memory of Wolfe is him threatening to fire me.

It sounds like he doesn’t hate me anymore, yet there’s something about me that gets under his skin. His jaw tightening yesterday was a dead giveaway.

I drag myself out of bed, the image of phantom nipples on display still haunting me. At least I can reassure myself that my day cannot possibly be worse than this nightmare.

Or so I hope.

???

Three hours later and I’m starting to find my rhythm again.

Matty and I have been engrossed in user flows and designs, bringing a rare slice of normalcy back into my confusing life.

People think designing a button is simple. That’s what the rest of the company sees us as—the button factory.

Sure, we just arbitrarily choose a color, slap on some Comic Sans, and stick whatever content we like on it, right? Who cares about button placement and picking the right hue?

Certainly not us designers. It’s not like we spend hours agonizing over every single pixel. Because heaven forbid if they have to deal with a poorly placed button or a user journey from hell.

“We’re finished.” I beam at Matty. “We’re ready to showcase.”

He eases back, yawning and tousling his messy hair. “About time. Most I’ve done all week.”

I bite back an eye roll. Technically I did 80 percent of it.

“No more shop talk, please. I swear, if we discuss one more thing about work, I’m going to book a vacation on the spot,” he grumbles. “Speaking of which…” He takes out his phone. With a few swipes, he shows me a photo of a luxurious swimming pool, with him grinning in the center. “Ring any bells?”

I peer at the image, straining for a jolt of recollection. “Is that… Wolfe’s place?”

“Yup. It’s like the Playboy Mansion. The guy’s got the whole nine yards. It’s a bummer he’s taking us to the back-ass of nowhere this time. The Vegas ones were wild. Honestly, I’m gutted.”

“Wow. That’s one hell of a pool.” I lean in for a closer look. “So, we’ve been to this place before?”

He nods. “Four times.”

“Four?”

“The last one was brutal—twenty hours straight with no breaks. But then Wolfe said we could hang around and live it up in the villa after. Man, that place is massive. I don’t even know how many rooms there are.”

More images of Wolfe’s pristine white mansion fill the screen as Matty swipes through.

“Talk about living in style.” I stare at the pictures. “Does he live there all by himself?”

“Seems so.” Matty shrugs. “Though, if gossip carries any truth, Wolfe’s hardly ever solitary.”