Theater: NovelMaster | Language: English | NEW
Synopsis
My boss was obsessed with "cutting costs and boosting efficiency."
His favorite trick was having me host VIP clients and front all the expenses.
Whenever it came time for reimbursements, though, there were always excuses, and key receipts somehow went missing.
I never made a fuss about it, quietly covering the shortfalls out of my own pocket.
Until one afternoon, I overheard my coworkers whispering behind my back in the breakroom:
"Notice how Chloe's always the one booking the five-star suites and fancy dinners for clients?"
"Yeah, and she never once complains or submits a full expense report. Imagine how much kickback money she's pocketing under the table."
My boss stood right there, sipping his coffee with an amused smirk. He didn't defend me. He basically let everyone assume I was embezzling company funds.
That completely broke my loyalty.
Over the years, how many thousands had I covered? First-class flights, luxury hotels, Michelin-starred meals. He’d only wire back a fraction months later, always feeding me the same line:
"Cash flow is tight this quarter. I'll bundle the rest in your next payout."
I had fronted at least fifty thousand dollars of my own hard-earned savings. And for what? A reputation as an office parasite lining her own pockets.
So, when my boss told me to book another round of luxury penthouses and fine dining for our biggest VIP clients...
I smiled and said yes. Then, I turned around and booked a run-down roadside motel and a cheap, greasy diner in an alley.
The tension at the table was suffocating. Everyone sat staring at the sticky laminate table, listening to the buzzing fluorescent light overhead in dead silence.
I smiled warmly. "Please, everyone, don't be shy. Help yourselves."
My boss, Richard, had a face so dark it looked like a thundercloud. The only reason he hadn’t blown his lid was because the VIP clients were sitting right there.
Veins bulged on his neck as he hissed under his breath, "Is this it? Are there more courses coming? Go tell the kitchen to hurry up."
"Everything's on the table," I replied calmly, gesturing toward the greasy plates. "Eat while it's hot. The decor might be a bit rough, but the food is authentic."
BAM!
Richard slammed his glass onto the table, his brow furrowed in fury. "We are entertaining our most important partners, and you bring them to a literal hole in the wall?!"
Beside him, the lead client, Marcus, gave a puzzled frown. "Chloe, did someone mix up the itinerary? This isn't quite the standard we're used to when working with your firm."
Normally, they’d be treated to private dining rooms at five-star hotels with wagyu steaks, fresh lobster, and vintage wine presented like works of art.
Tonight, we were crammed into a loud, narrow diner. Sure, the eight comfort-food dishes were decent diner fare, but the ambiance was nowhere near a multi-thousand-dollar corporate dinner.
No wonder they were shocked.
"No mistake," I said with a slight shake of my head.
Richard’s eyes burned red with rage. "I told you to book high-end accommodations and dining, and you drag our guests here?!"
I glanced at the cheap plates and sighed helplessly. "I'm so sorry, sir. But given the budget, this was the absolute best I could do."
My coworker, Kevin, immediately slammed his hands on the table and jumped up, pointing an accusing finger at me. "Stop playing dumb! Richard sent you six thousand dollars to arrange this whole thing!"
"This cheap meal and that filthy motel didn't even cost sixty bucks! Did you pocket the rest?!"
"I knew it! You always jump at the chance to travel and host clients because you're skimming off the top! But pulling this stunt tonight? That’s just brazen greed!"
Hearing Kevin’s accusation, the clients exchanged uneasy, suspicious glances.
Richard seized the narrative, his tone chillingly disappointed. "Chloe, I always looked the other way with your little side deals in the past."
"But tonight was about closing our company's biggest partnership. How could you be so selfish?"
A chicly dressed woman from the client's team pulled out an antiseptic wipe from her designer bag with visible disgust. "Richard, we’re not snobs, but basic food hygiene is the bare minimum, isn't it?"
She showed him the wipe—covered in a thick layer of black grime she’d just rubbed off her chair.
An older executive from their team, who had known me for years, shook his head. "Chloe, I always thought you were a bright, reliable professional. How could you resort to this?"
Disapproving stares closed in on me from every corner of the table.
Richard’s face flushed crimson as he barked, "Enough! Get on your phone, find a proper venue, and rebook right now. We'll deal with this later."
Marcus chimed in, trying to smooth things over, urging me to quickly move them to the Ritz as originally planned.
I didn’t budge. My posture stayed perfectly straight.
"I can't do that."
"What do you mean you can't?!" Richard finally lost his temper, his voice cracking.
I turned to him, looking straight into his eyes. "Richard, did you forget?"
"You only sent me six dollars today—with a note asking me to grab you a Starbucks Americano."
"As for the hotel and dinner, you told me to put it on my personal credit card like always, and that you'd 'reimburse me later.'"
Richard froze. Panic flickered across his eyes before he quickly masked it with forced composure.
He let out a dry, awkward chuckle, glaring daggers at me. "What nonsense are you talking about? I clearly wired you six grand for the arrangements."
Kevin sneered. "Still trying to lie your way out of this? I literally heard Richard telling you to book the Four Seasons!"
With Kevin backing him up, the clients looked even more doubtful.
The senior executive sighed heavily. "Embezzling company funds on a client trip... Chloe, this is a career-ending stain on your resume."
Seeing that no one believed me, I unlocked my phone, opened my mobile banking app, and spun the screen around for everyone to see.
"Take a look for yourselves. The only transfer Richard sent me today was exactly six dollars."
The memo line on the screen was crystal clear: *Grab me an iced Americano, thanks.*Richard had indeed claimed over the phone that he was wiring me six thousand dollars for the client hosting.
Yet the actual transfer notification was only for six bucks.
It was his favorite psychological trick.
Phone calls left no paper trail.
If I didn't bring it up, he'd pretend he never noticed. If I did, he’d claim accounting procedures were lagging and pressure me into fronting the cash.
Then came the guilt-tripping lecture:
"Young people shouldn't be so short-sighted about petty cash. Think about the bigger picture! Look at Kevin—he never nickel-and-dimes the company, and that's why he gets promoted."
"If you're going to pinch pennies over a routine advance, how can I trust you with major responsibilities?"
Marcus leaned in, squinted at my phone screen, and looked up at my boss. "Richard... the transfer is indeed just six dollars."
A flash of pure embarrassment washed over Richard’s face. He coughed awkwardly. "Ah, I've been so swamped today, I must have mistyped the amount. I'll have accounting wire it right over."
He threw me a resentful glare. "Why didn't you just tell me instead of making a scene?"
Grudgingly, he pulled out his phone and transferred eight hundred dollars to me via PayPal, his tone icy and curt:
"There. The money's sent. Now hurry up and get everything rebooked. Don't waste our guests' valuable time."
Before I could open my mouth, Kevin cut in loudly, "Boss, you shouldn't have sent her a dime!"
Kevin cast a venomous smirk at me and raised his voice for the whole room to hear. "Who knows how much she’s skimmed off client events over the years?!"
"Even if you made a typo on the transfer, couldn't she have just put it on her card first?"
"She intentionally brought everyone to this dump just to embarrass the company, all because she couldn't pocket an advance this time!"
Richard feigned annoyance and shot Kevin a stern look. "Stop spouting nonsense in front of our clients."
It looked like a reprimand, but it deliberately framed Kevin's accusation as undeniable truth.
My fingers hovered over my phone for a second. Then, without hesitation, I hit *Refund*.
"Since that's how you see it," I said coolly, "I just refunded the money. Feel free to handle the reservations yourself, Richard. Wouldn't want anyone accusing me of taking kickbacks again."
Richard’s smug expression froze instantly.
He knew better than anyone that accommodating this executive team with top-tier suites and a banquet would cost at least eight thousand dollars tonight.
Richard was a classic penny-pincher.
He preyed on the rough job market, knowing entry-level employees were terrified of getting fired.
Every time an important client visited, he’d bully the quiet, hardworking staffers into paying out of pocket. To outsiders, it looked like we were enjoying luxury perks and five-star meals on the company dime. In reality, every single cent came out of our own empty pockets, while Richard submitted the receipts to corporate and pocketed the reimbursement himself.
In the past, I put up with it because I desperately needed job stability.
Not anymore.
Kevin rolled his eyes, scoffing loudly. "Oh, playing the martyr now?"
"You want to refund money? Don't stop at eight hundred bucks! If you're so innocent, why don't you cough up every single cent you've embezzled over the years?!"
### 小说标题
The Six-Dollar VIP Dinner: Exposing My Boss's Scam### 全文翻译
"And since our partners are all sitting right here, let's put all the cards on the table and see how much kickback money you've actually pocketed!"
Hearing this, Richard’s face changed instantly.
He grabbed Kevin's arm. "We're in the middle of corporate negotiations! What kind of nonsense is this? We'll deal with this back at the office."
"No, we deal with it now!" Kevin jerked his arm free with force.
His eyes flared with raw resentment. "Don't think I'm blind, Richard! You deliberately hand all the VIP accounts to Chloe just so she can inflate the expense reports!"
"We’re in the same department! Why does she get handed every single massive account on a silver platter?"
"We are hashing this out in front of the partners tonight! Whatever illicit cut she's been skimming over the years, she needs to split it with the rest of the team!"
Watching Kevin’s furious expression, it hit me.
He wasn't standing up for company ethics or defending corporate interests.
He was simply green with envy, believing Richard had been feeding me lucrative perks and kickbacks behind closed doors.
He was throwing a tantrum in public just to blackmail his way into a cut of the non-existent pie.
Marcus, the lead client executive, joined in with an amused, pointed smirk. "Richard, you always boast about treating your team with total equity. Favoritism like this doesn't look very professional."
"Kevin, I get where you're coming from. Workplace fairness matters."
The rest of the client team leaned back, clearly entertained by the drama.
None of them actually cared about justice; they just loved watching their vendor’s internal dysfunction implode right before their eyes.
Richard’s face drained of color.Richard forced a strained, paper-thin smile:
"Apologies for the spectacle, everyone. We’ll handle our internal affairs internally. Marcus, why don't we reschedule this dinner for another night..."
With that, he started to get up to show the clients out.
Kevin took a wide step, blocking his path entirely. "Trying to sweep this under the rug, Richard?"
Richard offered an awkward, desperate chuckle. "Our enterprise software is undergoing an update right now, so internal billing logs aren't accessible. Tell you what, Kevin... I'll assign you a dedicated flagship account of your own..."
Kevin cut him off with a loud scoff:
"One account to shut me up? The dirty money she's pocketed over the years is worth way more than that!"
"Besides, this isn't just about money—it's about respect!"
"You two running this little corrupt scheme together... what does that make the rest of us? Did you honestly think the rest of the department was stupid?"
His words rang through the diner, prompting Marcus to start a slow clap.
"The kid’s got backbone."
"When a workplace is toxic and unfair, speaking out is the only way forward. You have our support, Kevin."
Marcus wore a sly, calculated grin as he casually pulled out his phone, pretending to check a notification while furiously typing.
He was messaging his executive team back at headquarters.
I saw through his game in an instant—he was exploiting our public meltdown as leverage to slash their contract pricing.
Sure enough, I caught a fleeting glimpse of the message on his screen: *Vendor's team is cannibalizing itself. Prime opening to squeeze their rates.*
Not content to stop there, Marcus threw in a few more inflammatory remarks, encouraging the rest of his team to grab front-row seats to the circus.
With the major clients seemingly backing him up, Kevin squared his shoulders, puffing out his chest with righteous fury.
He raised his voice. "You preach equity and transparency in every all-hands meeting, but you funnel all the sweet deals to your favorite behind closed doors. Did you really think we wouldn't notice?"
"Tonight, I'm getting the justice the rest of our team deserves!"
Richard shot me a frantic, pleading look, begging me to jump in and defuse the disaster.
Inside, I let out a bitter sigh.
As much as Richard disgusted me, this was still an internal company problem.
Air out our dirty laundry in front of major clients was bad enough, but letting them weaponize our feud to strip our contract to the bone crossed the line.
Between Marcus’s deliberate stirring of the pot and Kevin’s relentless badgering, the negotiation atmosphere was completely destroyed.
I didn't want personal grievances to torpedo a multi-million-dollar deal, nor did I want us to be the laughingstock of the industry.
So I spoke up, cutting Kevin off: "We can settle internal matters back at the office. Let’s focus on the contract first."
I gestured for him to lower his voice, but Kevin completely misread my intention.
He let out a venomous laugh. "Look who's talking! What right does the guilty party have to lecture me?"
"The team and I are the ones getting screwed over! Is asking for basic fairness a crime now?"
"If we go back to the office, you and Richard will just conspire to bury it! We settle this right here, right now!"
Kevin refused to let up, and Richard’s complexion grew darker by the second.
Then, as if a switch flipped in his head, Richard's face suddenly calmed down.
He looked at me with cold calculation. "Chloe, I’ll admit, giving you exclusive control over client entertainment wasn't entirely fair to Kevin."
I froze, about to snap back that every single cent had come out of my own savings, but Richard talked over me:
"Our past accounts are hard to audit right now, but you’ve certainly handled significant hospitality budgets over the years."
"How about this: you surrender your Senior Account Lead title to Kevin, and you forfeit your entire annual bonus to him as compensation. That will settle the matter."
Chapters (3)
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Watch & Promotions
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