Boston Noir Read Free

changes. She's bleeding.
    "Why is everyone so concerned about Beck? Beck is fine. Beck is more than fine. He got promoted today. Or was it yesterday? He gets to be an MD, and do you know how long it took him? A year. I've been here six years and I've been up for MD the past four. Do you know who the biggest alpha generator around here is?"
    "You?"
    "For the past two years."
    "What's an alpha?"
    "Alpha generation...it's just a way of showing who earns the most for the firm, who the best stock picker is, and it's me . Do you know what they told me last year? 'We can't promote you because you're too volatile. Everyone's afraid of you.' And the year before that? 'We can't promote you because you're too quiet. No one ever knows what you're thinking.'"
    "Take it easy. I'm not trying to upset you. I'm trying to get you to think through this thing logically with me. People will be coming to work in a few hours. You and me, we have to be done and out of here by then."
    She takes a turn too fast and nearly bangs into the corner of Trevor's desk. She uncrosses her arms and takes her fists from her armpits. "Do you have any idea what it's like to be strung along year after year, to get your hopes up and then get told...to have to sit and be told all the things that are wrong with you?"
    "No, I don't know what it's like to be in your position--your work position or the one you're in now. But I do know what it's like to get passed over. I got passed over for this job six times."
    He's saying all the right words. He's saying he understands because that's his job. But she hears it in his tone. You stupid bitch , he's thinking. You had everything--the money, the Back Bay condo, the friggin' horse farm in Millbrook. The shopping trips to London. And you do this? This is what you do? You stupid, spoiled rich little bitch .
    She grabs the earpiece, holds it directly in front of her mouth. "I made two and a half million dollars last year. What did you make?" Hits the button to end the call, and just like that Jimmy Tarbox is out of her head.
    But her head throbs. From the heat, maybe. Or dehydration. She pushes back against it with the heels of her hands against her eyes. She holds her jacket open and fans it, trying to air out. All night she's resisted taking it off--she never takes her jacket off in public--but it has to come off. It's too hard to breathe. What to do about Beck? She goes over and grabs the high back of his chair. It annoys her that he doesn't flinch anymore when she approaches. She turns him to face the wall. He can stare at Trevor's collection of golf photos.
    Instead of gliding off, the jacket's silk lining sticks to the damp insides of her elbows and she has to wrestle with it. Mother would be mortified. She settles it onto the hanger on the back of the door and stands with her arms wrapped around her. Spider-arms they used to call her, all the girls back at Monsignor Xavier Prep. She looks at Trevor's face. What had high school been like for him back in Manchester or Sheffield or wherever he was from? Probably no one ever called him names, but she didn't know. She didn't know much of anything about Trevor.
    Bony Sloany . That was another one. She had hated high school with every fiber in her bony body. Except for the stables. The horses and riding had saved her. These days, all that saves her is Rowan. She closes her eyes and tries to think of him. He can usually calm her down, but right now her head is too jammed.
    When she opens her eyes, there is Beck. She should kill him. Put the gun to the back of his head, pull the trigger, and put him down, all without ever having to look upon his classically handsome face again. She's already killed Trevor. Why not just do it now and let this end?
    Because she hadn't really thought it through with Trevor.
    She'd caught him trying to sneak out of the building without talking to her. Not even sneaking. Just walking out as if she hadn't been sitting in her office all day waiting for his