The Innocent Target

Chapter Two

One Month Earlier...

She played with her nails, staring at the blank laptop screen. She was supposed to finish her report by the last hour of dusk but all she had on her screen was December and it was three in the afternoon. Her stomach grumbled and she stared at the clear window to her right. Her office was on the perfect level. Tenth floor with her cubical right by the window. She could watch the snow trickle down from the white cloudy sky and the frost growing around the edges of the window panes. She was the only one in the office, except well her administer, pure workaholic and zero life of his own. He was sitting in his office and could eye him working on a few papers through the glass wall, separating him from his division. He was a bald guy with a bad eye for fashion and zero care for workspace arrangement. His office was always a mess.

Swinging on her chair, she twisted her mouth, balancing her pencil on her upper lip, reading every snowflake dancing down to the cold streets of Manhattan. It was so beautiful. Her stomach groaned and she dropped her head back.

"All done, Elliot?" She jumped, not knowing when her Administrator, Carl reached her.

"No." She smiled, apologizing.

"I have to go home." He rubbed his temple and she stared at the briefcase in his fingers.

"Oh."

"I want it tomorrow. Eleven, tomorrow night, is your deadline." He stated and a beaming smile broke on her face.

"Thanks." She chuckled.

"Yeah. Happy New Year." He nodded and left. It was December thirty-first. Last day of the extravagant year of 2018. Of course, she was joking when she said that. Her year could not have been better than the last. Still living under an overbearing rent, struggling like every average worker of New York and no relationship life. Relationship wasn't something she cared much for. It was a thing that happened for some people and didn't for the other. It was just the other essentials of life that bugged her when they fell and didn't hit the normal marker for a while.

Shutting her laptop, she set it in her messenger bag and put on her red coat. Fixing her white hat on top of her head and fixing the fluffy ball on top of it, she headed out. She'd waited a few minutes so as to avoid riding the elevator with her boss. Those rides were always so awkward. Always a possibility of them pointing out a work habit they didn't like of yours or maybe some extra work they could put on you, and the worst could be small talk. Yeah, she wasn't looking forward to that with dear old Carl. He wasn't worst boss in the world but she still dint admire his unhealthy workaholism.

Taking the elevator down to the lobby, she made way to her freedom. The clear glass doors that always seemed like gates to boredom every morning and a blessing by five. Her hours being a normal nine to five with a half hour break where she would sneak in a cup of coffee and maybe a bagel or donut. Right now, as she waved the receptionist goodbye, she craved something a little more than some bagel with stale cream cheese or a bad donut. She wanted a nice juicy Angus burger with a mint hot chocolate. She knew the perfect place but it was in the lesser crowded corner of the city, meaning a couple blocks down the street. She had to make a walk for it of course. No car. How could she even afford one? The world seemed to be letting that benefit stay to ones with hundred dollar bills in their pockets and Rolex on their wrists.

She checked her wallet of course, seeing if she could sneak in the extra treat before meeting her old friends from school tonight for a New Year's Eve celebration. She had a few twenties stuck in a corner and a surprise hundred dollar bill.

"Maybe I'm not that poor." She pouted, tucking the hundred in her front jean pocket and keeping the twenty in her wallet that went in her bag. She'd been robbed once and to her happiness, she had a hundred dollar bill once tucked in her jeans pocket and since then, she found it to be a brilliant idea to do that, incase she was left penniless in the middle of the street. New York was the perfect place to learn tactics. The place called for trouble and every one who moved the daily life in the busy downtown, had to have witnessed a mugging at least. That was her opinion but what did she know. Her trauma was enough to scare her of the strangers passing her by.