I am my company’s "lucky charm," the boss's ultimate talisman. To keep me around, the boss tried to seduce me with his looks. When that failed, he offered me a monthly salary of $88,000. I didn't have to do any actual work. My everyday routine was just slacking off and getting paid for it. Half a year later, the boss had a whirlwind wedding, and his new wife was helicoptered in as the Executive Vice President. Seeing how much free time I had, and finding out her husband used to aggressively pursue me, she decided to kick me out while he was away on a business trip. "I don't tolerate freeloaders in my sight. HR, give her a standard severance package and tell her to get lost!" My colleagues frantically pleaded for me: "VP, please reconsider! She's our lucky charm, a living four-leaf clover. The company literally cannot survive without her!" The boss's wife was furious at their pleading and stubbornly accused me of sleeping with the boss. I wasn't going to take that kind of insult. I went straight for the jugular. "Give me three months' severance, and I'll leave immediately!" Hehehe. My best friend had just started a company right upstairs, and I was stressing over how to find an excuse to quit. Thank you, Mrs. Boss, for the generous triple-salary severance gift! 01 My name is Penny Cash. Before I turned eighteen, I was a total magnet for bad luck. After starting college at eighteen, I met my roommate, Goldie Price, who was just as unlucky as I was. Two negatives make a positive. On the very first day we met, we bought a boba tea that came with a promotional scratch-off ticket, and we won $88,000. From that day on, our bad luck vanished, and we finally got to live normal lives. After graduation, I submitted hundreds of resumes, all of which sank to the bottom of the ocean. I was exhausted. Let it all burn. I laid around at home like a corpse for three months, and the more I laid there, the happier I felt. Just as I was about to abandon the idea of working altogether, determined to comfortably live off my four retired grandparents as a useless freeloader, the boss of a soon-to-be bankrupt company found me. "Ms. Cash, I'm begging you to save my life. Come work for my company, name your salary!" I thought it was a scam and flatly refused. This boss pulled a "persistence pays off" routine and staked out my house for eight days and eight nights. I called the cops. It turned out to be a massive misunderstanding. The boss finally revealed the truth. "My company is on the verge of bankruptcy. I suspected it was an occult issue, so I hired a top-tier psychic. The psychic pointed me to a solution: find a 22-year-old recent female college grad with the last name Cash living in Apartment 8B, Building 8 of Emerald Estates. Bring her in as a lucky mascot, and our luck will turn around." "Ms. Cash, I'm at the end of my rope. Science can't solve this, so I have to try the occult. Otherwise, my company goes under, I go bankrupt with tens of millions in debt, and the hundreds of employees under me will be jobless. In this terrible economy, what are they supposed to do..." The more he spoke, the more heartbroken he got. By the end, he was literally wailing and sobbing in front of me. The cops couldn't do anything and told us to resolve it ourselves. I went to his company for an on-site inspection. After looking at his various corporate licenses and certificates, confirming he was indeed the boss, I decided to help him out. "A monthly salary of $8,800. We'll sign a one-year contract first. I'll just be a lucky mascot. I won't do anything, just lay flat and slack off every day, okay?" "Oh, by the way, I don't want standard weekends. I want a four-day workweek. I'll pick one weekday every week to take off." Based on the current market rate for fresh college grads, and compared to my classmates' salaries, $8,800 was definitely upper-tier. I had no skills, and I didn't want to do anything. I was already very satisfied with this salary and benefits package. The boss, Harrison Cole, was also very satisfied. He agreed to all my demands and immediately signed the contract with me. I originally thought I just had dumb luck and ran into an idiot boss who had been brainwashed by a con artist. But right after we signed the contract, the Sales Director burst in, announcing that the major client he had been chasing for two months had agreed to sign—and was willing to increase the upfront deposit to 50 percent. The deposit from that order alone was enough to bring the company back from the dead. The boss dropped to his knees right there and gave me three loud, resounding kowtows. "My dear God, from now on, you are my Goddess of Wealth!" 02 Where there's a first time, there's a second, and then a third. The first resurrection from the dead could be called a coincidence. But in the days that followed, any business negotiation I attended was a guaranteed success. Any difficult client could be handled as long as I was there. Even when colleagues ran into stubborn clients, all they had to do was walk past my desk, chat with me for a bit, and when they went back, the client would instantly become incredibly agreeable. I, Penny Cash, was just that mystical! I coasted like this for half a year. My status in the company was even higher than Harrison's. Everyone said: You can offend the boss, but you absolutely must not offend me, or you'll definitely be cursed with bad luck. This point was proven three months into my employment. An intern saw me doing absolutely nothing all day. I don't know if she felt unbalanced or if she just had bubbles in her brain, but she insisted on "cleaning up the workplace." She used me as a target, a negative example, and fiercely criticized me. In the conference room, she tore me down to nothing, scolding me mercilessly. Because she was telling the truth, I didn't dare make a peep. I was as quiet as a quail. She left feeling incredibly satisfied. As a result, on her way home from work that very night, she got into a car accident. She lay in the hospital for half a month. When she came back, she refused to believe in the curse and tried to cause trouble for me again. Unsurprisingly, before the workday was even over, right after she tried to mess with me, she tripped over her own feet and face-planted hard, her arm violently smashing into a desk. Well, that did it. She earned herself a fracture, a three-day hospital stay, and a cast for half a month. It all happened too coincidentally. If I wasn't the person involved, I would have thought this intern was a paid actor I hired. After this incident, the legends about me in the company became even more bizarre. Everyone practically wanted to build a shrine for me. Especially that intern—her attitude did a 180-degree turn, and she became one of my most loyal sycophants. In just six months, the company on the verge of bankruptcy not only came back to life but scaled up to the point of preparing for an IPO. Because of this, my reputation as a lucky charm spread wildly through the CEO circles. Quite a few bosses wanted to poach me. The offers they threw out kept getting better and better. Harrison Cole, of course, knew this. To keep me, in my fifth month, he confessed his feelings to me, hoping to use his looks to tempt me. But he wasn't my type. I wasn't interested in this older, father-figure type of man. After I politely rejected him, he agonized over it, losing sleep every night and showing up to work with panda eyes. I couldn't stand watching it, so I gave him a tip. "Mr. Cole, I may not like you, but I love money!" His eyes burst with joyful light. He finalized it on the spot. "Great! Liking money is great! I'll give you a raise!" "A monthly salary of $88,000. Let's get rich together, it's a lucky number!" It was indeed very lucky. The month after my raise, the company's performance was better than the previous five months combined. Because he was single-mindedly pursuing love, thirty-year-old bachelor Harrison finally found the girl of his dreams that very month. He had a whirlwind wedding. He brought us a boss's wife, hired her into the company, and gave her the position of Executive Vice President. A lot of people in the company knew that Harrison had pursued me. So, in front of the boss's wife, Victoria Lodge, people rarely brought me up. Harrison himself didn't dare bring me up either. Victoria always assumed I was just some low-level employee earning a cheap salary to do nothing. Until the payroll was distributed that month. Victoria, on a whim, audited the employee payroll and discovered my astronomical salary. She was a fiery, impulsive woman. When she encountered a problem, she had to resolve it on the spot. But that day, Harrison happened to be on a business trip deep in some remote, mountainous area for a week-long project inspection, completely unreachable. Victoria spent two days investigating me. Finally, she reached a conclusion. I was an overpaid, useless parasite coasting by on my looks, waiting to die in the company. And someone who could potentially replace her position as the boss's wife at any moment. 03 She was furious. She couldn't sit still. She gathered all the company's employees in the conference room for a meeting. Once everyone was present, she slammed my six-month payroll statement onto the conference table. "Slacking off from morning till night, doing absolutely nothing! Penny Cash, what gives you the right to take a high salary of $88,000 a month?" "The rest of your colleagues work themselves to the bone every day, and the most they make is thirty or fifty grand! What gives you the right? Do you feel at peace taking this money? Doesn't your conscience hurt?" The conference room was dead silent. Victoria thought her words had stirred everyone's emotions and looked quite pleased with herself. "You earn what you work for. Penny, you do absolutely nothing all day and have contributed nothing to this company. So I've decided: starting next month, your salary will be reduced to $800." "The original $88,000 will be used to give an across-the-board raise to all the employees!" "Nobody has a problem with this proposal, right?" Huh? Wait a minute? Using my salary as a favor to buy people's loyalty for herself? Is this human behavior? You can touch me, but you can't touch my money. I slammed my hands on the table and stood up. Just as I was brewing my emotions and thinking about what to say, my dear colleagues couldn't sit still anymore. First was the Director of Sales Department 1. A forty-something rough-and-tumble guy from Texas, Mike Dawson. "VP Lodge, I disagree. Giving employees a raise is your own prerogative. What gives you the right to deduct from Penny's salary?" "Being generous at someone else's expense, do you have bubbles in your brain?" "Let me make my stance clear right now. I don't want this money. Don't give me a raise!" After he spoke, the other colleagues nodded in full agreement, stating they didn't want this raise and that my salary couldn't be cut. "Penny has made the biggest contributions to the company. You can't cut her pay. That $88,000 is exactly what she deserves. It's lucky!" "VP Lodge, you'd better wait until Mr. Cole gets back to discuss this, otherwise, you're definitely going to cause a massive disaster!" Everyone chimed in, one after another, fully defending me. Victoria's face turned livid with anger. She slammed the table and kicked a chair. "Enough! Shut up, all of you!" "I don't tolerate freeloaders in my sight. HR, process her severance with a standard package, and tell her to get lost!" Not cutting my pay anymore, now she's making me resign? As soon as these words came out, the conference room exploded even more. "VP, you can't do this! Penny cannot leave!" The Director of Sales Department 2 almost freaked out. "Penny is our company's lucky charm! If she leaves, what happens to our business? How will we close future deals?" The other colleagues echoed her sentiments. "Yeah, VP. If we don't have Penny, how are we supposed to handle difficult clients in the future?" "Exactly! If we don't have Penny, when we meet a tough client, won't I have to revise my proposals until I drop dead? You can't do this, VP, please spare my miserable life..." "VP, you can't drive away our mascot! When Mr. Cole gets back, he's definitely going to lose his mind!" "Boss's wife, she's our lucky koi! The company literally can't survive without her!" ... More and more people pleaded for me. Victoria's face grew uglier and uglier. The way she looked at me became extremely dark. I accidentally made eye contact with her and it gave me the chills. So scary. Victoria banged on the table twice. "All of you, shut your mouths!" "What's wrong with all of you? Every single one of you protecting her? What? Am I your boss's wife, or is she?" "I knew she was sleeping with Harrison! You're defending her so hard, you must have taken plenty of bribes from her before, right?" "You, you, and you—the ones yelling the loudest. Have you slept with her too?" A warrior can be killed, but not humiliated! You can hit me or scold me, but you absolutely cannot start dirty rumors about me! I've been single since birth for twenty-three years, a pure, super innocent little girl! Seeing the people she named turning red with anger. I slammed the table. "Enough, Victoria!" "Give me three months' severance, and I'll leave right now!" 04 The noisy conference room fell instantly silent. Everyone looked at me. Director Mike Dawson looked at me in disbelief, appearing as though he was about to cry. "P-Penny, what did you say? You want to leave? You're abandoning us?" The Director of Sales Department 2, Lily Henderson, lunged over and hugged my arm in a death grip. "Penny, you can't go! If you leave, how am I supposed to survive..." The usually aloof, professional woman was crying like a child in front of me. I patted her head. "Ah, well, all gatherings must come to an end. Since the VP doesn't like me and finds me to be an eyesore, staying at the company would just be a thorn in her side, wouldn't it?" "Anyway, I'm tired of this job too. As long as she can give me three months' severance, I'll pack my things and leave immediately." "Lily, don't stop me. We're talking about over two hundred and sixty thousand dollars here..." Saying this, I looked at the crowd with a bright smile. "Plus, everyone knows that a lot of companies have been trying to poach me. The offers they're giving aren't any worse than here..." Victoria let out a cold scoff. "You? Other companies want to poach you? You must be dreaming." "Once you leave our company, you useless piece of trash, you won't even find a job paying a thousand bucks!" At this point, everyone clearly saw that Victoria was not someone to be reasoned with. If I stayed, there would definitely be endless conflict. So everyone stopped trying to make me stay and instead offered me their sincere blessings. "Penny, wishing you a bright future. Keep in touch, and come back to visit us when you have time." I smiled and thanked them. Laughing secretly to myself, of course I'd come back to see them. After all, my front foot steps out of this company, and my back foot steps right upstairs. Hehehe. Finally, I met Victoria's gaze. "VP, do you accept my proposal? Three months' severance, paid immediately. As soon as I get the money, I walk." There was a reason I insisted on getting paid immediately. My best friend, Goldie Price, told me two months ago that she was opening a company, and she picked the location right upstairs from us. It officially opened just two days ago, and she had already rushed me several times, asking when I was going to come work for her. I was stressing over how to break it to Harrison Cole. Now this was perfect. Victoria handed me a pillow just as I wanted to sleep. But I was still worried that when Harrison came back, he'd refuse to honor it, and use withholding the triple severance to force me to come back. So, it was definitely better to settle it instantly. Victoria's brain was currently a bit scrambled from being stimulated by the colleagues' defense of me. She finalized it on the spot. "Fine! Three months' severance it is! As long as you're willing to leave, it's just over two hundred grand. I can afford it!" HR processed my resignation on the spot and wired me my final paycheck and severance, totaling $264,000. The moment I received the money, my colleagues cast sympathetic looks at Victoria. At the same time, they started worrying about their own futures. I happily counted my bank balance, turned back to my desk, and began packing. All my colleagues watched me leave. The two Sales Directors escorted me out, flanking me on the left and right, as we walked out the company doors together. Victoria followed right behind us, keeping a distance of about two meters. The three of us had just stepped out the door, while she was just reaching the entrance. Suddenly, the company's sign hanging overhead detached and plummeted straight down toward Victoria. A chorus of gasps erupted. "VP!" "Get out of the way!" Victoria realized something was wrong, looked up, and let out a terrified scream. "Ah!" "Help!" 05 By the time the three of us turned around to look, the sign had already crashed right at Victoria's feet. Although it didn't hit her, it scared the living daylights out of her. The colleagues who hadn't stepped out of the office yet silently took a step back, their faces full of lingering fear. At the same time, they started whispering to each other. "It's starting, it's starting. The last person who offended Penny, Sophie... if I recall correctly, it was a car accident followed by a broken bone, right?" "Yeah, yeah, Sophie had it rough! Our mascot Penny's authority is absolute!" "I tried to warn the VP not to be so impulsive. Look, she just kicked Penny out, and a second later she almost got crushed by the sign. Yikes..." "I feel like the VP is going to suffer some serious bad luck lately... she might even face a bloody disaster..." With everyone murmuring, Victoria, who was just scared half to death, instantly flew into a rage. She lifted her leg, stomped fiercely on the fallen sign, and glared viciously at the colleagues still inside. "A bunch of superstitious, filthy trash! This was just an accident! What does it have to do with Penny Cash?" "You say I'm going to have bad luck, but what bad luck did I have? The sign didn't hit me, did it? You all saw it, it grazed right past me. It fell so close but missed. Shouldn't you all consider me the lucky mascot instead?" She actually started feeling smug about it. The other colleagues who witnessed the whole thing weren't buying it. They rolled their eyes to the ceiling. The receptionist standing closest, Rainy Adams, mumbled softly, "Grazed you? That sign fell inches from your face. If you weren't flat-chested, it definitely would have knocked you over. You probably would've broken every bone in your body." As she spoke, she proudly thrust out her own impressive chest. At a 36D, she certainly had the capital to be proud. The look in Victoria's eyes was murderous. She stormed over to her viciously and slapped her right across the face. "You bitch! You dare say I have small boobs? Who the hell do you think you are? You think having a big chest makes you special? I've hated you since the first day I saw you. Strutting around the office all day with your chest pushed out, who are you trying to seduce?" "HR, get your ass over here, give her a standard severance package, and tell her to get lost too!" With that slap, everyone was stunned. Rainy clutched her cheek, taking a long moment to process it. "You hit me? Victoria, you dare hit me?" I silently lit a candle in my heart for Victoria. A lot of people in the company didn't know that Rainy's mother was actually the landlord of this entire premium office building. No, more accurately, this entire block of office buildings belonged to Rainy's family. And Rainy, after hearing about my reputation, had shamelessly begged to be the receptionist at our company. She said her mom had hired someone to read her fortune this year. It said she would face a fatal disaster at age twenty-four. The only way to resolve it was to find a female college grad in her early twenties with the last name Cash living in Apartment 8B, Building 8 of Emerald Estates, and spend at least half the month with her. When Rainy told me this, I seriously suspected the fortune teller her mom hired was the exact same feng shui master Harrison Cole had used. Because of this, she even moved into the apartment right below mine. We commuted together every day, and she brought me homemade lunches daily. Her cooking was amazing. The thought of leaving the company and potentially missing out on her cooking made me feel quite melancholy. But Victoria saying she wanted to fire her actually played right into my hands. 06 Victoria was acting incredibly arrogant, one hand on her hip, the other pointing right at Rainy's nose. "I hit you, so what? I'm the boss's wife, I can hit whoever I want!" The HR manager, who also knew Rainy's background, quickly tugged at Victoria's hem. "VP, you can't fire Rainy, she's..." "She's what? What kind of incredible background could a crappy receptionist have?" Victoria looked incredibly annoyed, threatening HR. "If you dare say one more word, believe it or not, I'll fire you too?" The HR lady rolled her eyes to the ceiling. She gave up trying to persuade her and solemnly confirmed with Victoria. "VP, are you absolutely sure you want to terminate Rainy Adams without cause and pay out her severance?" Victoria nodded firmly, "I'm sure." "Stop wasting time and process her paperwork right now!" HR obediently did as told. While the paperwork was being processed, Rainy swiftly packed her things, hugged her cardboard box, and stuck to my side. "Penny, I told you we were meant to be. We even got fired on the exact same day, hehehe." She giggled foolishly. Victoria looked at us and sneered coldly. "Everyone, take a good look. This is the consequence of offending me. If you don't want to get fired and want to keep working here, you'd better keep your eyes open from now on and know who the real master of this company is!" Since I joined this company, profits were good, and bonuses were plentiful. The colleagues' salaries and benefits also rose. It was a coveted workplace in the industry. Many people wanted to work here, but the hiring standards were high, so there wasn't much new blood coming in. Unless someone was exceptionally talented, they couldn't get in. Now that Victoria had laid down the law, many colleagues kept their mouths shut. After giving me a hand signal, they quickly returned to their desks. Sitting rigidly upright, terrified Victoria would go crazy and implicate them. Victoria was very satisfied with the employees' tactfulness. She crossed her arms, looking at us standing by the elevators, and mocked us. "I want to see what kind of good jobs you two can find after leaving this company! Two useless parasites relying on your looks to coast by!" She denied our abilities, but she acknowledged our beauty. That... actually made it kind of hard to hate her. I exchanged a glance with Rainy and almost couldn't hold back our laughter. "VP, thank you for the compliment. Best of luck to you." A flash of confusion crossed her eyes, but we didn't bother explaining. We stepped into the elevator and went upstairs. 07 My best friend, Goldie Price, was already waiting for me in her office. As soon as we stepped into the company, confetti rained down on our heads, wave after wave. "Welcome, welcome, a warm welcome!" My bestie rushed forward and gave me a massive bear hug. "Penny, I finally waited for you! From now on, us sisters are going to build a massive empire in the city!" The employees standing on both sides of the main entrance applauded thunderously. Rainy Adams stood behind me, dumbfounded. "As expected of a mascot. This is the kind of grand reception a mascot deserves!" She knew Goldie had opened a company upstairs, considering she was the one who signed the lease for this entire floor over to us. I held Goldie's left hand and turned back to hold Rainy's right hand. Standing beneath our company's sign, my heart surged with passion. "Golden Fortune LLC." A glittering, gold-plated sign. It looked grand and prosperous. Not bad at all. I was very satisfied. The company had been open for three days. Employees were in their positions, working systematically. As the co-owner with 45% of the shares, I couldn't just slack off and lay flat like I used to. But clearly, Goldie understood me perfectly. She handled all the company's affairs wonderfully; there was absolutely no need for me to do anything. When I started dozing off looking at documents for the Nth time, she poured me a glass of water. "Sister, if you really can't take it, why don't you go lie down for a bit? I'm terrified you're going to hit your head on the desk." As noon approached, Rainy brought food in from the room next door. She walked to the dining table with easy familiarity, setting out the dishes as she spoke: "Penny, you worked hard all morning. Come eat. I made your favorite sweet and sour spare ribs and wild ginseng chicken soup." Rainy's current position was still the company receptionist. But the actual receptionist role out front was already filled, so she didn't have to stay at her post all the time. Both Goldie and I had experienced her culinary skills. So, on the second day after we onboarded, we built a small private kitchen right next to my and Goldie's offices specifically for her. The aroma of the food finally drove the sleepiness out of my brain. Full of energy. "Alright!" Three dishes and a soup. It was the perfect amount for three girls. Just as we were eating, the other receptionist rushed frantically into our office. She looked genuinely panicked, forgetting to even knock. "Ms. Price, Ms. Cash, this is bad! There's a man outside claiming to be Ms. Cash's boss causing a scene, insisting we hand Ms. Cash over!" Oh my. I had forgotten about that. Harrison Cole, who was inspecting a project deep in the remote mountains, was scheduled to return to his company today. But with delicious food right in front of me, I couldn't let it go to waste. I swallowed a mouthful of chicken soup. "Let him wait. The sky could fall, the earth could crack, but eating is the most important thing. Don't let him interrupt my meal." The receptionist hesitated. The next second, Harrison burst in. With a sliding kneel. He dropped straight to his knees right in front of us. "Penny! My Goddess of Wealth, please come back! The company can't survive without you!" A thirty-year-old grown man, currently crying like a complete idiot. I rolled my eyes and spit out a chicken bone.
? Continue the story here ?? ? Download the "MotoNovel" app ? search for "426731", and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel