Star Struck(8)

He actually thinks I’m going to sit back and let him dictate what goes on in my world; he has another thing coming. I hope Garrett doesn’t agree with him. It’ll serve him right. In fact, having Garrett overseeing my safety might be better. I know it will be. Garrett can help me get my man back.



~ 5 ~



“Mo, I want you to meet Brenda. She’s my new assistant.”

They shook hands. “Girl, you should be a hand model.” Mo held her hand up and looked at it from different angles. “They’re so soft.”

Hailey pulled Brenda’s hand away. “Ignore him. Come on, I’ll introduce you to everyone else.”

“Think about it. I have a friend who could hook you up,” Mo said.

Brenda followed Hailey throughout the building as Hailey made her introductions. “Bach is the head of security and will be able to tell you everything there is to know.”

Hailey felt Brenda was in capable hands. She left the two alone as she prepared for the taping of her show. The show went off without a hitch. Brenda was waiting near her office. “Did you get a chance to see any of the show?” Hailey asked.

“I caught some of it, but I mostly spent the time going over the letters Bach had. I’m having some of my people run some tests. So far nobody has been able to get any prints, but don’t worry. Working together, we should get to the bottom of things.”

“I still think everybody is overreacting,” Hailey confessed.

“You never can be sure in incidents like this. It’s best to be prepared than not.” Brenda followed Hailey inside the room. She sat down at her make-shift desk and began typing something into her laptop.

Jackie, Hailey’s assistant, stormed through the door. “I heard you hired a new assistant. If you were going to fire me, you could have called me,” she complained.

“Jackie, we have company.” Hailey wasn’t in the mood to deal with her sometimes overly sensitive assistant.

Brenda waved. “Hi, I’m Brenda.”

Jackie ignored Brenda. “I know who you are.”

“You’ve forgotten the golden rule. There can only be one queen in the midst.” Hailey pointed at herself. “And that’s me. Since you’re so concerned about your job, I’ve been saving some things for you.”

Hailey handed her a folder filled with sheets of papers. “I need you to contact these people and see if they are willing to come on the show. I’ve already made some notes for you; so you really don’t have much to do.”

“If I’m doing all of this, what is she here for?”

Hailey pushed her towards the door. “You worry about the list and I’ll worry about Brenda. Now skedaddle.”

“If looks could kill, I would have been dead on the spot,” Brenda joked.

“She’ll be alright.”

“As soon as I have her checked out thoroughly, you need to tell her who I am.”

“Competition is good for the soul.”

“That’s an evil young lady if I ever met one.”

Hailey hoped Jackie wasn’t guilty of sending her the pictures and letters. She trusted her with so much of her day to day operations that it would be the ultimate betrayal. It would hurt her almost as much as Trevon’s upcoming nuptials. She slid the invitation out of her purse and read the date. She looked at her calendar. She needed to convince him that marrying that other woman would be a mistake. The countdown was on. She had exactly six weeks.



***



Garrett sat behind the desk of his home office. He listened as Brenda gave him an update on the situation with Hailey. “The security system has been installed and I did a run through. All’s secure,” Brenda assured him.

“I still can’t believe she was left wide open as far as security is concerned,” Garrett commented.

“She was impressed with the new system. I showed her how to activate and deactivate. So far no more strange letters.”

“Good. We’ll keep you with her a few more weeks and if nothing else happens, I’ll probably pull you from this project and reassign you.”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Brenda responded.

Garrett stretched his arms out as he moved his head from side to side to release the tension in his neck. He had been in and out of meetings all day with prospective clients. Trevon had taken the day off which left him with handling everything. He was mentally exhausted and looked forward to a long hot shower and laying across his king sized bed.

The business phone rang so his shower would have to wait. “I should have let it go to voice mail,” he said to himself as Shareeka’s voice blasted from the other end.