"What, ma'am? 30% cut?"
Oliver gasped at Grace's decision, which was clearly very detrimental to him.
All of his work had been done and Oliver had chosen to play the game as a time sink. That shouldn't be a problem.
"Why the silence? So just don't be a person. During work hours, you're playing games!" Grace turned around, about to leave.
"Wait, Ma'am!" exclaimed Oliver.
"What, you want to protest? Okay. If you protest, I'll cut your salary by another five percent!" Grace said with a cold stare at Oliver.
"But all my tasks have been completed, ma'am. So, Ms. Grace has no reason to penalize me," Oliver kept his voice as flat as possible.
He actually wanted to turn on his computer screen and show Grace that all his work had been completed.
"Don't brag! It hasn't even been an hour since I gave you that assignment. There's no way it's going to get done!"
Grace's voice was high-pitched. It was obvious that she was on fire.
Oliver was confused by his boss. Grace was so sensitive and easily provoked.
"If you don't believe me, see for yourself."
Oliver calmly reconnected the computer's power plug and turned it on.
With calm and confident movements, Oliver opened the work folder that had been neatly stored on the drive.
"Go ahead, ma'am."
Oliver got up from his chair and invited Grace to sit down and check his work. He looked calm. After all, he was innocent.
Grace sat on Oliver's chair and grabbed the mouse roughly. Her chin was raised high as she checked the files on the computer with squinting eyes. She was getting ready to scold Oliver even more.
But...
Oliver only watched from behind as he slowly saw Grace's expression change.
"This...," Grace said reflexively.
Realizing that Oliver had indeed completed the task she had given him neatly and even exceeded her expectations, Grace was embarrassed. If Oliver had completed his assignment, he could use his free time however he wanted.
"How's it going, Ma'am?" He asked without meaning to.
"Uh... oh... okay. You did a good job. I'm sorry. But next time please don't play games during working hours."
Grace got up awkwardly.
"My salary won't be cut, ma'am?" asked Oliver again.
"No," Grace replied shortly without looking at Oliver and walked quickly out of the room.
Oliver breathed a sigh of relief. That was close.
Once again, Oliver had managed to escape the eye of the needle. However, he couldn't understand why Grace seemed to hate him so much for such a trivial thing.
'Women are hard to understand,' Oliver thought, shaking his head.
As if she knew he was thinking about her, Grace appeared behind the open door of Oliver's room again.
After disappearing for a moment, it seemed that Grace had managed to restore her confidence that had been shattered by her misjudgment of Oliver.
"Oliver, come with me now!"
Without waiting for an answer from Oliver, Grace turned around and left.
"Y-yeah, ma'am. Wait." Oliver chased after Grace's figure.
Really, Oliver didn't understand what was going through the mind of this woman named Grace.
When Oliver left the room, Grace was already standing at the end of the corridor, waiting for him with an impatient face. Oliver approached. Grace walked quickly down the stairs to the basement of the building.
"Where are we going, ma'am?" asked Oliver, who was struggling to keep up with Grace's fast pace.
"Don't ask too many questions, just follow me," Grace said without reducing the speed of her footsteps.
They reached the basement, but Grace didn't stop there. She kept walking quickly towards the stairs that Oliver didn't know where they led.
The atmosphere there was really quiet. It seemed to be an unused part of the building.
Grace walked up the stairs in front of Oliver until her hips, which were wrapped in a span skirt above her knees, seemed to be swaying in time with her footsteps.
Oliver swallowed hard to wet his dry throat. He could vaguely see the outline of the triangular panties printed on Grace's skirt.
Oliver had to exert all his strength to hold back his hand that itched to tap Grace's rear bumper.
'You can't, Oliver, you can't get a hold of yourself!" he pleaded with himself.
They reached the top of the stairs, which turned out to be a long corridor with a row of closing doors. Grace approached the nearest door and opened it.
It's dark. The room was dark.
Grace entered the dark room first.
"Come in here."
Grace said as she opened the door of the room wide so that light could enter there.
With a furrowed brow, Oliver stepped over the threshold with all kinds of thoughts in his head.
A dark room. Away from people. A woman and a man.
'Maybe Grace will ask me to have sex here,' whispered a small voice in the corner of Oliver's head.
"Come in quickly."
Grace grabbed Oliver's arm, pulling him into the room. Oliver staggered, trying to balance himself.
"Clean up this place!"
Suddenly, Grace pushed Oliver's body so hard that Oliver fell down on one of the chairs with a broken seat. In the next second, Grace ran out of the room and closed the door.
The room was instantly pitch black.
Click!
There was the sound of a door lock being turned.
Oliver got up from the chair and ran towards the door.
'Bruk! Bruk!'
Grace had just locked the door!
"Open the door! Open the door, Ms. Grace!" Oliver shouted while hitting the door with his fist.
For a while, Oliver kept doing that, but nothing happened.
He put his ear to the door. It was silent. It looked like Grace had left.
"Damn it. Has she gone mad?" Oliver complained.
'Crack!'
Oliver vented his emotions by kicking the door. Of course, it was in vain. The door did not open. In fact, because the door leaf was made of quality wooden planks, Oliver's feet were now quite sore.
"Damn it. It's so dark in here. What does she want me to do here?" Oliver grumbled.
Oliver took a deep breath. He was annoyed. His lunchtime had been wasted by a few minutes.
Now he looked around while trying to focus, looking for something that could be used. And then his gaze fell on the broken sofa he had been sitting on.
With almost zero lighting, Oliver searched for something inside the sofa seat with his hands.
'It should be here,' Oliver thought as he continued to search.
And he found it!
Oliver pulled out a long, thin wire from inside the seat. The wire that had been woven into the upholstery.
Oliver wrapped the wire around himself and shaped it into the shape he needed.
Once he was sure the wire was in the right shape, Oliver inserted the wire into the keyhole.
Sweat poured down Oliver's back and forehead as he concentrated fully on opening the lock with emergency tools. The room was not only dark but also stuffy and dusty.
As he continued to work with the wire in his hand, Oliver thought about Grace again, unable to believe that his boss would lock him up in a room like this. Hadn't she apologized for her mistake earlier?
'Click!'
The sound of the door lock successfully hooked onto the end of the wire sounded so melodious to Oliver's ears. Oliver slowly turned the door handle and...
It opened!
Oliver quickly exited the room.
Then, half-running, Oliver went down the stairs to his room again. He felt like his throat was so dry that it was begging to be moistened. Once in his room, Oliver quickly grabbed a water bottle and gulped down the contents.
Disturbed by the thumping sound of Oliver running, Grace came out of her room and looked into Oliver's room.
It just so happened that Oliver was looking at the glass door and could clearly see the shock on Grace's face.
Their gazes met.
Grace's eyes widened like she was seeing a ghost.
"You..."
Oliver shrugged his shoulders as if to tell Grace that he was fine. Whatever his boss was trying to do to him, the woman had failed.
Grace snorted. She stomped her foot on the floor before disappearing from Oliver's sight.
Oliver let out a long breath, dropping his body onto a chair.
"What the hell," he muttered.
He glanced at the clock on the wall next to the door, which showed it was lunch break. Just as he was about to go to the cafeteria, his cell phone rang loudly. An incoming call from Nancy.
"Hello, Nan. What's wrong?"
"Oliver. Please come to my campus! Hurry up!"
There was panic in Nancy's voice.
"Why?"
"Come here quickly! Jack's gang is acting up again! They just teamed up to do something to Tisha!"
Click.
Call disconnected.
Continued ....