Persistence

Chapter 1

Mr.Donahew tossed the gigantic stack of papers on Emma’s desk.
“By lunch sweetie” he said and winked as he walked by her.
Somewhat disgusted she managed to say “ Yes sir “ and not look quite as revolted as she felt.
Her employer was always such a jerk to her. Thank god this job wasn’t permanent. Barely out of college, this was the only job the 21 year old could get accepted at. Administrative assistant was not exactly her “dream job” , but it paid the bills.
She glanced up at the small clock above her on the wall. 12:05. just 3 more hours. She let her head fall and hit the back of her office chair. Forgetting it was plastic and not cushioned since her irritating boss insisted on switching their chairs last week she let out an “Ow!” and yet again all the other people near her were staring at her like she was just another ditzy temp. Just dandy.
Sure the business was well built ,but the employees were assholes. But then again, isn’t that how all corporations are these days?
She kicked off her heals under the desk, now knowing that she would have to work through lunch to get this pile diminished.
There was one good thing about working at this retched place however. Rory, her best friend since before she could remember worked on the other side of the complex. Rory was of course short for Lorelei. Their mothers had met at Lamas class when Emma’s mother was just starting the class and Lorelei’s mother went into labor next to her. They’d been friends ever since ,and Emma and Rory didn’t stop the tradition. It was lunch hour and as usual ,since it was Friday, Rory would be coming over to Emma’s desk and beg for her to detach herself from the small uncomfortable desk she called her office. Emma peeked up at the clock again. That was odd.
It was 12:30 and no Rory.
“Oh well, she’s probably just running late.” she thought to herself.
Just then the new intern the company had hired last week walked up to Emma’s cramped desk. She looked scared ,but that wasn’t something new for the interns at Williams & Grey Law Firm. It was silent for a moment and the girl just stood there.
“Um...did you need something? “ Emma said finally looking up at her.
“Someone’s here for you miss.” She finally managed to say
“ Did they happen to say their name?”
“ N-no miss”
“ Calm down kid. You look like you’re having a heart attack. “
“ Y-yes ma’am” the girl said as she turned and left.
Emma then slid her shoes back on and got up to go talk to the frightened intern.
“Damn heels” she muttered when she was having slight difficulties with the small buckle of her heels.
“Want some help?” a low and terrifyingly familiar voice said from behind the other side of her desk.
Emma immediately froze. She automatically knew exactly who the voice belonged to. Scott was back.
She took a deep breath then forced herself to say the words
“ I got it. “
You see Scott was this literally insane, disgustingly disturbing stalker that had been chasing down Emma since the day she broke up with him. Scott has gotten dangerously close to killing Emma as he has raped her numerous times and injured her beyond severely. Scott was her first boyfriend at the age of 13. To say the least he couldn’t manage to “let go”. So much for innocent relationships when your young.
Emma didn’t dare to look up. She didn’t want to look at that monstrous face most likely smiling down at her.
“Come here.” He said staring at her long brown hair as that was all he could see at the moment.
“Scott I-“
he cut off her sentence when he grabbed her wrist to firmly and might I add unwillingly yank Emma up to her feet.
“I’ll do the talking.”
“No need to cause a scene Scott.” said Emma.
She only seemed calm because she didn’t want to scare the people somewhat near her. Not many people still remained in the boringly glum office building , but she wasn’t prepared for a fight and would most definitely avoid one at all costs.
“As you wish” he paused ever so slightly.” Dearest.” Scott smiled. A crooked smile, a smile that almost told you exactly what he was thinking. Well, at least to the point of the fact that you knew it was not even relatively close to something even okay.
He gave the wrist he now held firmly in his tight grip a squeeze, then released it from its deadly prison hold.
“Come on”
Scott was now leading the way to one of the three elevators in the building. Emma reached the desk of the intern that was temporarily her assistant and said “I’ll be taking my break now. Could you please inform anyone who would happen to be looking for me” Emma smiled and pretended to be calm so as not to further frighten the poor girl.
“Y-yes ma’am” she replied.
Emma then moved on to the elevator door and pushed the down button on the side panel. She remained silent until they reached the parking lot outside. That was odd. Rory’s car was gone.
“ Guess she wanted to be alone this week…” Emma thought to herself. “No big…” Emma wasn’t one to hold grudges or for that matter care about little things like this. Scott came to a sudden stop next to a bright yellow Ferrari.
“Subtle.” Emma remarked sarcastically.
“You like it ,baby?” Scott leaned in close to Emma. Uncomfortably close. Emma rolled her eyes.
“What do you want ,Scott?” She said in a disgusted tone.
“You” Scott smiled that almost snicker of a smile , that smile that made you want to run away right then and there because nothing good ever came of that smile being formed.
She could feel his breath against her soft cheek. She didn’t like that. He leaned closer and brushed a few strands of her brown hair away from her face.
Emma backed up slightly , obviously not approving of the small amount of distance between them. She gulped , a shaky almost shivering gulp. She couldn’t look at his face anymore.
“Scott just tell me what you want from me and get away.” She said as she stared away at the gravel of the quiet, secluded parking lot.
“ I want you, Emma Ross. Every single day. You’ve always been the one for me. Can’t you see I’m in love with you? I’ve loved you since the day we met.” He pulled her close again by putting his arm around her waist.
Emma’s heart beat faster. The tears were starting to slowly make their way to her blue eyes.
“This is how you would treat the woman you love? Scott you make no sense to me. How can you love me if all you do is hurt me? I don’t love you Scott Hunter ,and if you truly loved me, show it. Leave me the hell alone.” A single tear slid in the silence.
“Fine.” Scott said. He was pissed now ,and it was obvious from his tone. He forcibly removed his arm from around her small waist and shoved her back about five feet. Emma fell back and landed in an awkward position forcing her to use her wrist to catch her sudden slip. She glanced back up at Scott. She couldn’t figure out what he was feeling. He refused to look at her -well, her face anyway. Scott then bolted back to where he had parked his almost neon car and peeled out of the parking lot. Emma stumbled back to her feet and rolled her wrist to check the damage. No permanent injuries here. She couldn’t make sense of anything. He didn’t even try to take her this time…but why? Why did he leave so quickly? Was someone here? What was all that bullshit about him loving her? She quickly snapped out of her questioning daydream realizing she was still technically supposed to be working at her desk and started walking toward the office building. She ran her fingers through her hair slowly to push back a few loose hairs when she was reaching for the handle of the door to the office building and flinched at the fairly recent memory of Scott doing that particular action for her. She headed for the elevator and stepped. Nobody else was in it except Emma. She took a few deep breaths and waited for the elevator to finally make its way to the 16th floor. The elevator stopped at the 7th floor. She sighed and waited for the fellow passenger to enter.
“What floor?” She managed to smile and look pleasant for the business man.
“Which ever floor you’re headed to hunny.” He said and winked at her for a short second then proceeded to look in front of him and smiled to himself as if he should be proud of gesture.
Emma just rolled her eyes and waited for the elevator to move again.
“You got a name missy?” he said now leaning on one arm and flat out staring at her.
Emma didn’t reply.
“Aw, now that’s a real shame.”
“Excuse me?”
He held her left hand up so as to put at eye level for himself.
“The good ones are always spoken for.”
“ Like you would have a chance either way.” Emma mumbled under her breath and jerked her hand back to her side. 16th floor. Thank god. Emma stepped out and the young intern stopped her on her way back to her desk.
“M-miss R-Ross”
“Yea, Julia?”
Her assistant calmed down a little after hearing the calmness in Emma’s voice. It was a fake composure ,but composure none the less.
“Oh, um Miss Holbertson was looking for you”
Emma was confused. Rory’s car was gone when Emma was in the parking lot.
“Thank you” she walked back to her desk and noticed a small yellow post-it note stuck to the monitor of her computer. She figured it was from Rory and began to read it. Emma was dismayed to find the note
to be in Scott’s handwriting instead of Emma’s.
“ Next time I’d cooperate if I were you. It would be a shame to make you a widow so young.”
She crumpled up the note and shoved it in the wire waste basket at the end of her rectangular desk. She tried to ignore the contents of the note and began to lessen the amount of papers next to her monitor.
Only on her third paper, Rory came up to her desk. Emma was particularly focused and hadn’t heard her footsteps.
“Hey ,Em”
“God!’ Emma jumped.
“Sorry” Rory laughed ,walking around the perimeter of Emma’s desk and creating a bench out of it by sitting on top of it.
“How was lunch?” Emma said.
“Okay, I guess. Missed you though –where’d you disappear to?”
“Nowhere” She turned back to her stack of papers and got on with her work.
“You busy?”
“Kind of, sorry Ror. I’ll call you later okay? I promise.”
“Okay…” Rory was now officially confused ,but she let it go and left to find her way back to her own desk.
Eventually the stack of papers was cleared and Emma was done for the day at the usual five-o-clock time. She logged her time sheet for the day in the computer, shut it down, and pushed her office chair in. Grabbing her coat and purse she headed for the elevator door. Rory was there waiting. Emma decided to take the stairs tonight.
“ Don’t forget” said Rory.
“Huh?”
“Call me. You promised.” Rory smiled.
“Oh, yeah, right.” Emma vanished out the door to the stairway and made her way through the front door to get to her car patiently waiting for her in the now almost empty parking lot. She unlocked the car and saw yet another note on the seat of the driver’s seat.
Knowing she would regret it she opened it anyway.
“Miss you ,babe. Love, Aiden”
She smiled for about a second almost forgetting the events of the day. When she reached reality again, a sudden burst of passionate anger came over her as she began to drive her way out of the driveway of the parking lot to make it home.
She was impatient as hell at this point. Pissed didn't even begin to cover it. She couldn't stop thinking about Scott.
She came to a red light in an intersection where there was only one car, hers.
"Fucking idiots." she thought as she considered the thought process of the makers of the lighting system at this particular intersection might have been.
The light finally changed and she only had one more turn to make until she made it home.