INVISIBLE POWER BOOK TWO: ALEX NOZIAK (INVISIBLE RECRUITS) by Mary Buckham Read Free Book Online

like her life depended on it.
    “Excuse me?” The woman didn’t look up.
    I cleared my throat. “Excuse me, Miss?”
    Nada. The guy next to her cast us both a wary glance then went back to talking to a balding woman in front of him.
    Okay, I’d tried to play nice. Now I’d play it the Noziak way. So I leaned forward and lowered my voice to a syrupy sweetness. “Hey bitch?”
    That had the French woman’s head snapping up.
    “Yes, you,” I continued, leaning even closer. “Where are the elevators?”
    The woman waved to the west.
    “ Merci. And have a good day,” I chirped, feeling so much better about bearding a warlock in his den.

 
    CHAPTER 12
     
    By the time I reached the fiftieth floor my optimism was flagging . Or maybe it was the uncomfortable carnival-ride feeling my stomach got every time I rode an elevator. Mud Lake didn’t have enough buildings in it to need elevators past the third floor and most of them were so old I could run up the stairs and beat them to my destination.
    That free-floating feeling got worse as I spoke to Bran’s receptionist who looked like the twin of the woman downstairs.
    “ Si non possible ,” the receptionist shrugged and shook her head at the same time, which helped me get the message. Why didn’t Bran have a bilingual receptionist? But who was I to complain, my only other language was sarcasm.
    “ Pourquoi ?”  I asked, glad of the one word I had down pat. Why?
    The woman rolled off a spat of French that sounded nice but meant nothing to me. So I used the universal shrug and raised hand response I was learning to perfect.
    “ Un meeting. Very, very important.”Why hadn’t I thought about that? Of course Bran would be up to his sexy eyeballs in meetings. But it wasn’t like I could make an appointment with him either. He’d probably like that, but I wouldn’t and he’d no doubt blow me off.
    So what now?
    I glanced at the closed office door. Stay and wait like a good girl or barge in on this very important meeting?
    Flashing a quick he-won’t-blame-you-I-hope smile at the receptionist whose shoulders relaxed, I ambled over to a series of frou-frou chairs around a glass table . Trailing fingers along the magazines resting there, as if I read these all the time, not. I waited until the receptionist turned away before I marched to the door.
    I was going in!
    “ Mais, mademoiselle!” the receptionist squawked. But it was too late, I was already bumping the door closed behind me on the incensed woman.
    “It’s not her fault,” I said as I stepped deeper into the room just in case the receptionist decided to ram the door. Then I stopped, looking around at the space that made my dad’s farmhouse look like a shanty in comparison. The floor to ceiling windows along one wall were enough to bling me blind even if they had that special glare-coating stuff on them. Feeling as disjointed as Kelly was after doing her disappearing act, I blinked to get oriented and then wished I hadn’t.
    I don’t know what I expected. Maybe a lot of stuffed shirts with double chins sitting around a massive table. Wrong.
    There were only two people in the room. One a stunning blond with mile-long legs lounging in a chair on my side of a massive desk, and Bran, glaring from the other side.
    I was used to Bran’s thunder frowns. He tended to use them a lot around me, but I wasn’t used to facing women who belonged on magazine covers or in the Miss Universe contest. A new dress model for Bran’s tours? Or someone else?
    Refusing to feel the quick stab of jealousy that last thought created, I notched my chin up, steeled my voice and looked only at Bran. “We need to talk.”
    Bran opened his mouth as if to say something then thought better of it as he ran one hand through his devil-dark hair and shook his head. “Miss Worthington,” he said, smiling at the sexpot in the chair with a look he used to give me. “May I introduce Miss Alex Noziak.”
    “ Bonjour ,” the other woman