RIVAL HEARTS: FORBIDDEN LOVE TRIANGLE

Two men stood dressed in neatly tailored black suits, mini microphones hanging from their ears. Watching me.



I'd just stepped off the bus into New York City, still trying to process the last six hours of my life, and somehow two strangers had already found a reason to stare.



I looked away, telling myself it was nothing. New York was probably full of strange men in suits.



Buzz.



I glanced at my phone, hoping it was Emilia. It wasn't.



Unknown Number: Welcome to New York City, Ama Wellington. I've been expecting you.



My hands began to fidget so hard that my phone nearly slipped from my hands.



I looked up. The two men were gone. Like they were never there.



"What the fuck..." I whispered.



***




Six hours earlier, I hadn't known any of this was coming. I'd only known the rain and the sound of my father's voice.



The evening sky continually grew darker as raindrops lashed the roofs of buildings in Boston, and thunder kept rumbling like powerful drums.



I gripped the car keys tightly, trying to slip past the living room without him noticing me.



"And where exactly are you heading to?"



A loud, deep masculine voice stopped me from behind-Tom Wellington, my father.



"Uhm, I... uhm, want to get something from the store down the block," I stammered.



"And you are taking the car along with you?"



"Yeah, it's raining outside and..." I tried to explain, but his voice cut in.



"Silence, Ama! Do you know how much it cost me to repair that car? The same car that broke down because of you. Thirty dollars wasted!" His voice became more aggressive.



"I didn't do anything," I whispered, but my voice was barely heard.



"You are to blame for your mother's illness. Ama! You are good for nothing!" I could see the rage in his eyes as he stared at me with disgust.



"STOP! STOP! STOP IT!" I yelled out.



The whole room that was full of shouts became a graveyard, and the raindrops outside became a melodious rhythm.



"Why do you hate me so much? What have I done to deserve this from you? You never let me live a normal life; you're never in support of me getting a job. You've always seen me as a failure. All of my efforts to make you proud of me have been nothing but in vain. Why? Tell me why?"



My father stood there in shock, his lips parted, and his eyes widened. This was the first time I had ever spoken back to him while he was scolding me.



"Why, Father? Why don't you love me? In my twenty-three years of living, I've longed for a father's love. My dad's love and-"



"Who is your father? I am not your father," he said as he interrupted me.



Once again, the room erupted into silence.



"Tom, stop, please." Following the direction of the voice, it was my mother. She kept sobbing in the corner.



"Louis, it's been sixteen bloody years, I'm fed up. Don't you think it's time she knows? Let her know the truth." 



"What truth?"



"No, please. Don't tell her." My mother collapsed to the ground in tears and anguish. She kept begging my dad not to tell me.



"What are you guys talking about? Tom, what is she saying? What are you saying? I am your daughter. Why did you say I am not?" I asked, but they both turned a deaf ear.



My mother kept shaking her head, signalling to my father not to let me know.



"Dad?" I whispered.



"I am not your goddamn father, you brat! I am not your father. Your father is evil. You are carrying the blood of a killer, not my blood." He turned to me, as his hands stopped midway, inches from hitting me.



I used my hands as a support to cover my face in fear.



My heart pounded against my chest. I lifted my gaze, and his hands were still frozen in the air.



I stole a glance at my mother on the floor. Her eyes poured out tears and her mouth held secrets, but she didn't utter a word.



"Fine!" I said as I stormed out to my bedroom.



"Ring, ring."



(Call forwarded, calling Emilia.)



"Hey, Emilia?"



"Hey, girl, how are you?" Emilia replied



"Can I stay over at your place for a while? I'm coming to New York tonight."



"Okay, no problem. Are you fine? You sound upset. You good?" Emilia questioned.



Fighting the urge to break down. "I would explain when I get there. See you later," I said and cut the call.



I stuffed my belongings and tossed them into the box. My chest tightened as I remembered his words- "You are good-for-nothing, Ama."



He doesn't consider me his daughter. So he makes up lies that I am not his daughter. If he isn't my father, then who is?



I packed up my remaining belongings: my personal diary, my medications, and a little cash at hand.



His words still rang in my head, and I vowed to myself to prove him wrong. I grabbed my bags and went straight for the main entrance.



"Ama, please don't leave, please. I'm trying to protect you," My mother kept begging me as I reached the living room.



"Protect me from what? From who?"



But there was no response from her. I pushed open the main door, and the rain rushed towards me like a tornado.



But I didn't stop to think twice about the decision I was about to take, as I made my way down into the wet streets of Boston.


***



I hopped on the next bus going to New York and found a vacant seat by the window, leaning my head against it.



Had I made the right choice?



Ding.



A text from Emilia: Hey girl, I just got home. 


Call me when you arrive in New York. Be safe.



I took a deep breath, swallowed my medications, and tried to push away the anxiety sitting heavy in my chest.



All my life, I had only known those walls of chaos and physical abuse from my father. 



I had always dreamed of owning my own accounting firm one day. My supposed father never supported that dream either.


Looking back as the lights of Boston slowly faded from sight, a smile grew on my face. I wasn't running away from that life; I took a step to start my own, and it starts with New York City.



The bus speaker crackled to life. "Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to New York City."



This was it. A life I knew nothing about, and nothing to hold onto but the hope that it would be better than the one I'd left behind.



The bus hissed to a stop. I pulled out my phone.


Emilia, come pick me up. I'm at the bus station.



Ok babe, I'm on my way, she replied instantly.



I stepped off, and the city lights hit me all at once - brighter, louder, faster than anything Boston had ever offered. I couldn't stop looking around.



The crowd swallowed me almost instantly, people rushing in every direction, suitcases dragged against the floor, phones pressed to ears. I turned to get my bearings and collided with someone.


"Oh, I'm so sorry."


"It's fine, thank you-" I started.


But she was already gone, disappearing into the crowd before I could get a proper look at her face.



I shook it off and kept walking toward the entrance, a bright smile tugging at my mouth despite everything.



New York City. My new beginning.

The email had said nine a.m. sharp. It was 8:15 a.m., and I stood before the glass walls of Starlak Corporation. My resume pressed flat against my chest.


My jaw dropped as I stepped into the lobby, which was polished with marble floors and chandelier light.


"Good morning. Welcome to Starlak Corporation. How may I help you?" The receptionist asked.


"I'm here for an interview scheduled for 9am."


"Okay, follow me." She led me to another room where other applicants were waiting. 


I gazed around the building in awe. The glass tower of Starlak Corporation was more intimidating in person than any photo online had shown me. 


I settled into a navy blue outfit, which Emilia insisted I wear after the blizzard morning of outfit changes.


I adjusted my blazer as I sat upright, my chest tightened, running through every answer I'd rehearsed in the mirror.


I had applied to Starlak a month ago, but I never got a response. Emilia always pressured me to apply to other places, but I couldn't let it go. Everything I'd read about Starlak told me that was where I was supposed to be.


Now sitting in the room, after living rent-free in Emilia's apartment, I could finally feel a new start for Ama Wellington.


"Ama Wellington?" 


I swallowed a pill before I walked in.


The interview panel sat behind a long table - three of them, sharp suits, sharper expressions. I answered every question they threw at me. Confident. Prepared. I could feel myself doing well, could see it in the way one of them nodded along.


After my interview, I didn't know what to expect; a sense of confidence, yet fear, encompassed me. "Yeah, I got this," I said to myself.


I spent one reckless hour daydreaming about my life here, maybe the start of something.


"Good day, everyone." A lady called out. She looked precise, controlled, who looks like she's never been caught off guard.


"I'm Elena Woods. The senior secretary in this establishment. I'm glad to have all of you here. With me are the results from the interview and your credentials already submitted." She said with a warm smile on her face.


Looking at the piece of paper in her hands, I knew my name had to be assigned to one post for sure.


"And it's going to be an honour working with you all. Good luck."


My eyes lit with excitement as I anticipated my name.


The first was called.


And another 


And another.


"Congratulations to the selected; the rest of you can try again next time. Thank you." 


"That's not all right? I mean, I didn't hear my name. There is another list, right?" I didn't know why or when I said that. The whole room stopped, staring at me.


"What's your name, Miss?" Elena stepped towards me.


"Ama Wellington." 


"Miss Wellington, thank you for your time today." Her voice was pleasant, rehearsed - the voice of someone who'd delivered this exact speech many times before. Unfortunately, the board has decided to go in another direction. You're not what Starlak is looking for at this time."


Not what Starlak is looking for. Not good enough. The words rearranged themselves in my head until they sounded exactly like my father's voice, and something in me - exhaustion, maybe, or the last scraped edge of my pride - wouldn't let me just nod and leave the way I usually did.


"Why? There must be a reason why?"


Elena blinked at me, like I wasn't meant to question their verdict. "I'm sorry?"


"You said another direction. I'd like to know what that means. I answered every question exactly how I prepared for it. So either I did something wrong that I'm not aware of, or the reason isn't really about the interview at all." My voice shook on the last few words, but I didn't look away from her.


Other candidates began to whisper to each other, but in all, I stood unshaken before Elena.


"Hmm... Miss Ama,  you can rest assured that our board members aren't biased in their decisions. It's simply a board decision, Miss Wellington. I don't have further details to share. Thank you."She replied.


I didn't know what else to say. I didn't have anything to prove. Maybe I was just too afraid to accept the fact that I'd lost once again. So I thanked her, because that was the only thing left to do.


 I walked out with my folder still pressed to my chest. I stopped by the cafeteria to get coffee before making my way to the elevator.


By the time I hit the lobby, my eyes were burning with tears. Good for nothing. How can I change my life when I can't even secure a job? How can I prove him wrong?


I was walking too fast, not looking where I was going, not minding the conversation happening around me, until I hit something.


Better still, someone-hard enough that my coffee slipped out of my hands, down onto an expensive-looking shirt.


"Fuck. Watch where you're going." The man snapped. 


With my face still bowed down. "I'm so sorry. I wasn't looking; let me help you clean it off." I grabbed a napkin from my bag and started dabbing his shirt before I fully understood I was touching a stranger's chest in the middle of a lobby.


He caught my wrist and yanked it out hard. "Get your hands off me. Who allowed someone like her inside?"


I stood there, coffee-stained napkin in my hands, head still bowed to the ground in the same company that had just rejected me. Now, I accidentally spilt coffee all over a total stranger; I should have just stayed home.


"Throw this woman out of here. She doesn't have a place here." The man yelled.


Something in me, already raw and bleeding from the last two hours, snapped clean in half.


I finally looked up. Tall. Sharp-dressed. Eyes the colour of something I'd never seen on a person before - emerald green, burning straight through me with a fury that had nowhere else to go, apparently, except me.


"Excuse me?" My voice came out sharper than I meant it to. "Who the hell do you think you are? With your cheap designer suit you probably got from Primark. Asshole."


I didn't wait for his response. I walked straight out of Starlak Corporation, past a lobby full of strangers staring after me, and didn't look back once.


***



I cried into Emilia's arms the second I got home. She didn't ask questions, just held me until I was ready to talk, then made me eat something even though I had no appetite.


That night, I wrote in my diary until my hand cramped, my thoughts circling back - not to the interview, not even to the coffee-stained stranger, but to my father's voice. You are good for nothing.


Maybe he was right.


I picked up my phone, and I found myself hovering over my mother's contact - my thumb an inch from calling her. 


But I didn't call. Some doors, once you close them, you tell yourself you're not allowed to open them again.


I was almost asleep when my phone buzzed - an email; the subject startled me awake: Welcome to Starlak - Offer of Employment.


I sat up so fast and read it twice, then a third time, waiting for the words to rearrange themselves into a rejection like everything else had that day. But they didn't.


"Ahhhhhhhh," I screamed so loud the whole neighbourhood probably heard.


Emilia rushed towards me as I waved the phone over her face. 


A few hours ago, Elena told me I had no position. Now the same company is offering me a position I hadn't even applied for. Secretary to the CEO. 


None of it made sense, and no part of me believed it was luck.


Ding.


Another message came, but not from Starlak.


Unknown number: Congratulations, Ama. You don't know me yet. But you will.

"Oh shit! I'm late!" I shot out of bed and rushed into the bathroom. I was supposed to be at the office by 7 a.m., but it was already 6:50 a.m.


I'd told myself last night that I would leave early, be composed, be the version of myself who had this handled.


But here I was jumping from one pair of trousers to another, with my hair still rolled in a messy bun.


"So let me get this straight." Emilia lay in bed, watching me in total confusion. "You got a job as the secretary to the CEO. From the same Starlak who told you to your face you weren't what they were looking for."


"Yeah."


"And this doesn't feel weird to you at all?" 


"I don't know, babe." I dragged a brush through my tangled hair as I slid into my heels at the same time. "All I know is, I'm the secretary to the goddamn CEO. But when I get there, I will figure it out."


"Okay, Miss Starlak. If you say so."


I stared at myself in the mirror- blazer straightened, ponytail tight, a girl who was given a position overnight. 


"Byeee...get going already. You can do it." Emilia said. She had put down her phone; all her focus was on me bearing a warm smile on her face.


Emilia's words meant a lot. She had a way of putting herself out there- bold, courageous, glamorous Instagram influencer.


I nodded softly and grabbed my bag.


***


The cab dropped me in front of the tower, and for a second I just stood there, the same glass and marble that had rejected me yesterday now waiting to let me in.


"I can do this," I whispered to myself and dashed in.


The second I got in, I spotted Elena Woods. She stood by the receptionist desk like she had been waiting for my arrival.


"Good morning, Miss Ama. I've been expecting you." Her tone was calm, the same as yesterday, but this time with a very bright smile.


But I wasn't moved by any of that. "I want to understand. You had told me I didn't get the position. Then hours later I get an email saying I have a job I never applied for. Secretary to the CEO." 

 

Elena sighed. "Believe me when I say this, Miss Ama, I was surprised.  The board simply told me to send the offer. But you're here, and you look ready, so." She gestured toward the elevators. "Shall we?"


"Fine."  


"Good. I will take you to see the CEO first. He is waiting for you. He doesn't tolerate lateness, but it's your first day; he may let it slide." 


I followed her as she filled me in on things to know- pointing in every direction, names of floors and different areas. Half of me was listening, but the other was still wandering in the strangeness of it all. Rejected at nine. Hired by midnight. A text from a stranger who already knew my name.


"Here we are." We stopped in front of a double door. "Ready?"


I swallowed hard. This is it. Time to meet my boss, and as they; First impression is important. "Yes."


She knocked once and didn't wait for an answer before pushing the door open.


The office swallowed me the second I stepped inside - half the walls white and clean, the other half floor-to-ceiling was glass looking out over the city.


A man stood with his back to us, phone pressed to his ear, tall, broad-shouldered. His reflection glimmered on the glass wall.


"I'll call you back." The voice stopped me cold. Just a few words, and I recognised that voice from yesterday.


Oh my God.


He turned around.


"Good morning, sir. This is Ama Wellington, your new secretary."


My stomach dropped.  The man I'd drenched in coffee. The man whose expensive suit I'd insulted, calling it Primark, in front of a room full of people.


Now, standing in front of me- A desk nameplate coated in black with the writing inscribed in gold. 

CEO STARLAK CORPORATION. 

My boss.


Somewhere in between, I wanted to run away. My fingers fussed around with the strap of my bag. 


He looked at me the way you'd look at a stain you hadn't finished cleaning - slow, deliberate, head to heels - and I stood very still, praying to whatever was listening that he wouldn't place my face.


To Elena, it probably looked like an ordinary introduction. Between him and me, it was something else entirely.


So much for first impressions.


No word was said. He just turned back to the window-and that was it, a dismissal.  I took it and let myself breathe again.


Elena led me out, down to my desk. She ran through the basics - an intercom that only he could ring, a landline, a stack of forms and files to begin with. "One more thing," she said, already halfway turned to leave. "The CEO isn't known for his kindness. Good luck."


"What's his name?" I questioned.


"Marcus Voss."


The name landed heavy against my chest. Marcus Voss. My nightmare. 


I sat down slowly, hands trembling against the edge of the desk, replaying every version of how badly this could go. What if he already knows? What if this whole job is just his way of making me pay for the coffee?


"You're fine, Ama," I whispered to myself, though I didn't believe it. "Just do the work. There won't be a problem."


My phone buzzed in my bag before I'd even finished the sentence.


Louis(Mom).


I stared at the screen. She hadn't called once since I'd left Boston-not that night, not the next day. A month had passed since I got here; why was she calling me now?


["Mom?"]


["Ama." Her voice came out thin, stretched. "You need to come home, please. Today."]


["What are you saying? I can't. I just got a job, and New York is turning out how I want things to be."]


Something in her voice made the hairs on my arms rise. 


["Please, you have to come home... Boston is safe. It's a trap- just come home-"]


["Louis! Mom! I can't hear you. What is a trap? Nobody is telling me anything."]


Something in her tone made the hair on my arms rise - not pleading this time, but frightened, in a way I'd never heard from her, not even the night everything fell apart.


["They're on-to-you. I don't have time to explain. But you need to-"]


The line went dead.


I stood there with the phone still pressed to my ear, the dial tone humming against my skull, my mother's voice already gone. 


They're on to you. Who were they? On to me for what? I hadn't done anything except get on a bus and try to build something out of the wreckage she and Tom had caused me.


I called back. Straight to voicemail.


 Called again. Same thing.


I bit my fingernails, trying to figure out what she meant when the intercom on my desk screamed to life.


Everyone's heads turned towards me. I forced a smile I didn't feel. I knew it was Marcus calling, and I picked up immediately, afraid of any mess-up when it came to him.


"Hello?"


"My office."


The line went dead.


I set my phone down. 


My mother's warning and Marcus's summons sat side by side in my chest now, two separate threats that had, somehow, in the space of one buzzing phone, started to feel like the same kind of danger that finds you no matter how far you run.


I smoothed my blazer, because it was the only thing I could control, and made myself walk.

"He remembers," I muttered under my breath.


I knocked softly on his door.


"Come in."


My heart slammed against my ribs as I pushed it open.