CHAPTER 8

"Ms. Hardin?" Ruby heard a voice called and she jerk out of her thought.

That meant that it was almost her turn, seeing as the woman they had just called was beside her. Her nervousness increased and she tried taking a deep breath so that she could calm her nerves down a notch. It was just like that, no problem at all, but she was prone to riling herself up like that all the time.

It wasn't her fault, it was probably how she was wired, plus it was Olivia’s fault for not hinting her about the job before this morning. Now, everything was a disaster.

It wasn't only her work life that was a disaster though. Her love life was the worst, but she couldn't think about that now. She shook her head and muttered to herself again, wanting for this interview to be over as fast as it could.

She had prepared all the way here in the car for the interview and she had even practiced some of the questions she knew they always asked in common.

She just hoped that her nerves wouldn't get in the way and she would do great so that she could get her life back on track. She needed to do that for herself, or else, sooner rather than later, she would become a liability to her cousin, and that was far from what she wanted. It was either that or she became homeless, even though she knew that would never happen with Olivia in the picture, so she didn’t want to put her in a corner or anything.

They had come too far to get her for her to let that happen, and knowing that she was her cousin would make it even harder to allow. They had both gone to bed hungry too many times in the past and things had only been better recently, so Ruby knew better than not to get a job soon, no matter how long she wanted to push back finding one.

She knew Olivia wouldn't mind holding fort until she was able to find a job, but it would be difficult for them both, and she knew how proud she was. She would never accept help from Liam even if he offered, not that Ruby would want someone else to shoulder their responsibility.

Olivia had only taken the car because she knew how much it would save and she could transit from work to home those late nights she worked the night shift or closed late in the hospital, and because it wasn’t new as well.

Ruby sighed to clear her head again and focus on running the questions in her head.

Soon, the door to the interview room pulled open and the woman walked out smiling as if they had just offered her the job right there on the spot.

That gave Ruby the scare but she swallowed hard against the lump in her throat and told herself that it was all right. She might not have found this jib herself, but it didn’t mean that she didn’t want it as bad as the next person.

A voice called her name. "Ms. Miller." She heard and she stood up from her seat. Slowly, just so that she could steady her breathing, she walked towards the door that would probably seal her fate.

She put her hand on the doorknob and twisted it to open the door, then she pushed it in and entered. There were three people sitting behind a long desk in the room with no smile on their faces or humor in their eyes.

There was a woman and two men and they were wearing a business suits and looked all proper.

It wasn't until they offered Ruby a seat that she realized that she had left her bag out in the hall.

"Sit down, Ms. Miller." The woman repeated, and Ruby not knowing what to do just stared at her with an open mouth, and then when she finally found her voice, she said. "I'm so sorry but I think I forgot my bag in the hall."

The interviewers looked at themselves and then they looked at her with a look on their faces that gave her the chills.

Shit, this wasn’t sure looking good.

The woman frowned up at her and asked. "Did you say you forgot your bag out in the hall?" She was looking at Ruby as if she had never heard that statement before in her life.

Ruby nodded her head and said yes. "I'm so sorry about that, I'll just go grab it and I'll be right back." She said. As she turned to go, the woman cleared her throat to stop her.

"Ahem!"

Ruby stopped and she turned back to face her. "I'm sorry?" She asked.

"What makes you think that we have that amount of time to waste Ms. Miller?" The woman asked her.

Ruby frowned. "I'm sorry, ma'am. I know you don't have the time, but I was so nervous and that was why I forgot the bag. I'll just go grab it and be right back." She said.

One of the men smiled as if what she had said was funny. She knew that they wanted this to end as well as she does, but she was the one at fault and she had to make sure to make it right.

She wanted to beat herself up for this. For goodness sake, how could she had forgotten something that important, she asked herself.

The woman looked at the two men and whispered something to them, then she turned to Ruby and said. "Well, you can go take your bag from the hall," she started and Ruby interrupted.

"Oh, thank you very much, ma'am. Thank you. I will be quick and be right back." She said.

The woman shook her head. "No, you don't understand." She said. "When you go out to pick your bag from the hall, don't bother coming back. We don't want to employ someone who would forget something as important as a handbag in this company. It just showed how incompetent you are going to be for this job. Have a nice day, Ms. Miller." She said.

Ruby frowned. It was as if she didn't hear what the woman had said right. That was it, right? It couldn't be that she had told her never to come back. She hadn't even done the interview yet and it was over already? That wasn't possible, that can't be what she had said.

Stammering, she said. "Huh, excuse me?"

The woman nodded with a stupid smile on her face. "Yes, that's right, Ms. Miller. You are excused." She said to her, saying the word one by one to allow her seemingly slow brain to process them.

Ruby opened her mouth to apologize and say that she would rather stay for the interview, but no words came out of her mouth.

"Have a nice day, Ms. Miller. Enjoy job hunting." The woman said.

Ruby swallowed back the tears that were threatening to fall and she turned her back to leave.

When she opened the door, the voice called another person. They weren't joking about her not coming back. Slowly, she walked back to the place where she was sitting before, and when she got there, she froze.

Her bag was missing.

She had all the last cash she had in that bag, and it was gone. She looked around the room to see that everyone was minding their business but someone wasn't there anymore, and she hadn't done her interview yet. She had been sitting beside the lady beside her, but now she was gone.

Ruby had seen her look at her once or twice while she was still in the hall. Turned out she wasn't there for the interview, she had come to do a job, and now her bag was missing, with her money and phone. She was going to have to walk home.

Olivia was going to flip when she hear about how she had messed things up here. She had been so nervous she had ruined the interview without even taking it, and then she had made it worse by losing her bag with her phone and money.

Today was simply nothing short of a disaster.

As she walked out of that place, she started to cry, and just with her stupid luck, the rain started to fall.