Putting It to the Test. Lori Borrill

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СКАЧАТЬ people on the staff. He needed one person in there as his anchor to make sure the job ran smoothly.”

      “And that anchor couldn’t have been me?”

      “Carly, they love your work. You and Matt are the two top designers on staff. They still consider you one of the best.”

      “They did before Matt came along. Now who knows what they think? I haven’t had a challenging project in over a year. It’s just the same old stuff, info screens without any user interactivity. How am I supposed to keep up my programming skills if I’m just putting graphics and text on pages?”

      This job was not working out as she’d planned. She wasn’t supposed to have hit a glass ceiling at the age of twenty-six. She was supposed to be on her way up the ladder, making the steady climb to bigger jobs and a bigger salary. Granted, she hadn’t expected to spend her life working for Hall, but she’d thought as new opportunities opened up she’d continue to be in the running. But since Matt had come on board, her career seemed to have come to a screeching halt, and if she wanted to keep progressing, maybe it was time to accept the fact that she’d have to do it somewhere else.

      “I’m tempted to quit.”

      Bev scoffed. “And go where? The high-tech industry is barely picking up around here. To find anyone hiring, you practically have to move to Texas.”

      “I could go to Web Tactics.”

      “Rumor has it they aren’t doing so well.”

      Carly’d heard that, too. Oh, who was she kidding? She’d just bought a house with a hefty mortgage. She couldn’t risk losing it by leaving a secure job for something unknown. Wherever she went, she’d be the new gal on the team, the first one on the chopping block if a company decided to downsize, and with so many firms being swallowed up by the big fish or relocating out of state, she wasn’t certain she could take the chance.

      “I could move to Texas, but Mom and Jodi need me.”

      “They rely on you for a lot.”

      Carly sighed. She knew if she left Hall Technologies, she’d find a way to make things work, but making a move like that out of anger wasn’t the smartest thing to do.

      Right now she felt stuck, and if there was anything Carly hated, it was feeling trapped without choices.

      “It’s not fair,” she said, the tone coming off whinier than she’d intended. “They should be giving everyone opportunities to be challenged. When they announced how they were handling the assignment of Singles Inc., I thought they’d finally seen that and done something about it.” Gazing out toward a clump of cattails, she added, “I guess I was wrong.”

      “I don’t know about that. I heard another rumor today.”

      “There’s more?”

      Bev nodded.

      “Is it good news?”

      “I don’t know. It’s all in how you choose to speculate.”

      Carly clasped her fingers around the seat of the wooden bench and braced herself. “What is it?”

      “I heard Hall’s planning to open a new management position.”

      “A manager?”

      This was news. Mr. Hall had always preached the hazards of being top-heavy, which was why so far he only had two managers under him—Hugh Simonds, in charge of the programmers, and Frank Meyer, Carly’s own manager and head of the creative-design team. The sales staff reported directly to Mr. Hall, as did Renee and Andrea, the two women who handled Human Resources and Payroll. The idea of a new position opening up was a big deal.

      “Any idea who’s getting the job?”

      Bev shook her head. “Not a clue. I don’t even know if he’s planning to hire from within or bring in someone from the outside. But what I’ve heard is he wants to put together a team that exclusively handles the bigger projects and that he plans to assign the team a leader.”

      “A special project team, huh?”

      “To take on jobs like Singles Inc. I guess he wants to keep moving in that direction.”

      The mention of Singles Inc. darkened Carly’s mood. “And if he’s thinking about hiring from within, you know what golden child he’s got in mind.”

      Bev quickly held up a hand. “No one’s said Matt’s getting that job.”

      “But it’s obvious he’d be considered. They’re handing him Singles Inc., aren’t they?”

      Bev shrugged and Carly’s infuriation mounted. “I’ll kill myself if they give him that job.”

      “Carly, you’re getting too far ahead of yourself. No one even knows if Hall’s going to promote anyone on the team. He could have a golfing buddy or some IBM crony in mind. Who knows? And if he was planning to promote from within, who’s to say you wouldn’t be considered? You’ve been here from the start, have handled just as many big projects as Matt has and you’re a way better people person. There’s a lot more to managing staff than technical expertise.”

      Carly knew that, but did Mr. Hall? And what if he did think technical skills mattered most? If that was the case, whoever handled Singles Inc. would have the best shot at proving themselves where that was concerned.

      And she wanted a shot at that job.

      She deserved it. In fact, she shouldn’t even have to fight for it after all these years. She should simply get it. But apparently Mr. Hall didn’t see it that way. Which meant she’d have to show him.

      “I need to get on that project,” she said.

      “Huh?”

      “Singles Inc. I need that job.”

      “Then you’ll have to match Matt’s answers closer than anyone else on the team.”

      Carly’s hopes faded. “And of all the women on the team, I probably know the least about him.”

      “But you and I are the only women on the team who know he’s the guy to match.”

      True, she did have that advantage. But unfortunately, thanks to a two-year-long resentment, coupled with her relentless attraction toward the man, she’d all but avoided Matt from the start. What she knew about him could be jotted down on a two-inch sticky note. She knew he was single, lived in an upscale condo down in Sausalito, drove a shiny BMW, had once played baseball and looked delicious in faded Levi’s. That was the sum of her Matt Jacobs knowledge. Five basic facts. Plenty to feed her sexual daydreams but hardly enough to strike gold on a compatibility survey.

      Attempting to change her answers to match his would be a total shot in the dark. Unless she had help.

      “How close a friend are you to Patty?”

      Bev shook her head in protest. “Oh, no. You could get in big trouble. Our company’s image would be at stake, and you know how Hall feels about that. If Singles Inc. found out we’d tampered with their survey СКАЧАТЬ