Lucky Ticket by Ed Lindsey (good book club books TXT) 📕

Lucky Ticket

Chapter One

Mary Barlow is a computer software specialist for one of New York’s finest software corporations. The corporation is a world leader in anti-theft information software. The many hackers around the world, that have been stealing their way into many companies financial records, and private papers ,will soon be very disappointed, when the many companies buy her software, and install it in their systems. The Hackers will soon find out that they can not crack the software code to get in, and Mary has the privilege of promoting it herself, because she is the one that helped design it. It is a simple software, where if a hacker even tries to get into anyone’s system, a tracker, which is the bug of the software , attaché’s itself to the hacker’s computer site without being noticed, and sends back information to the victims computer telling it where the hacker's location is. With this information the company can have the hacker arrested and successfully prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The Software Corporation is now sending her to Los Angeles, California in a couple days, to a Software Conference, to promote her new software, The Tracker. Mary started at the corporation fresh out of college a year ago. And now she is one of the company’s main assets, and at $150,000.00 a year plus benefits, she does not plan on going anywhere, anytime soon.


Chapter Two

Mary’s boss Ted Reid was just sitting back in his chair puffing on the remains of a Havana cigar, after having his secretary call Mary to his office. Coffee and Danish are ready and waiting for Mary’s arrival, because like any boss in this business, he likes to keep his specialist's happy. Even though he has 60 other specialists working for him Mary is his bright and shining star at this time. This conference that he is shipping Mary off to was very important, and if she was successful, could produce millions of dollars for his company. And now he hears a knock on his office door, as his secretary ushers Miss Barlow in. Ted rose and greeted Miss Barlow, and offered her coffee, and a Danish before their little meeting. With coffee and Danish in both of their hands, and now seated at the small business table in his office, Ted was not talking to Mary about her upcoming sales pitch, at the conference.Ted was asking about small things, like how is Bobby? And what he was doing now days? Bobby, is Mary’s only brother, who came to New York with her seeking employment. Bobby landed a job as a journalist, for one New York’s newspapers, and doing very well. He is older at 24, and a very brilliant journalist. They are currently sharing a apartment together, being that everything is so expensive in New York. Both brother and sister are not seeing anyone, and they are not dating anyone special. This had surprised Ted when Mary told him, as he peered at Mary now through his 50 year old eyes. Mary is far from being, what was called back in his days of going to school, a nerd. He is looking at a young woman with long freshly washed red hair, which is slightly scented with lavender. Her sparkling green eyes, with flecks of gold belie the intelligence that lay behind them. Her creamed colored non blemished face, and her skin was that of a model's. Her small mouth, and sparkling white teeth when she laughed would melt any man’s cold heart. Her long legs, and small framed body more or less glided across the floor, when she walked into a room. At 5ft 10 inches, she was as tall as Ted’s 6ft, when she was in heels. Today she is dressed in a light yellow flowered dress, with white heels, and she is completely glowing, like the bright morning November sun. If Ted was not married to his wife of thirty years, and was at least 25 years younger, he could see himself chasing this woman! But he loves his wife, and three children deeply, and this job also, has supported them well through the years. This job is a lot better, than when he was a youngster, and going from door to door, selling vacuum cleaners for a living.

Chapter Three

The small talk is now done, along with the coffee and Danish, and Ted and Mary are still sitting at the small meeting table. The talk has changed to Mary’s presentation, to all the major companies that are going to be, attending this year’s conference. Mary’s presentation was very good, and needed very few changes, and the product she is going to present, actually sells itself, without any extra help, unlike in Ted’s day, when he knocked on a customer’s door selling vacuum cleaners. Ted would put his foot in the door, when a customer would open it,just as the company told him to do, and on some occasions walked away with a badly swollen foot, when a housewife would slam the door on his foot. And on other occasions was met at the door, by a hungry man eating dog, or a bad housewife, who did not do her morning vacuum cleaning of the rugs yet. The last was the worst sometimes. Ted would vacuum rugs to demonstrate the vacuum’s amazing power, and would end up doing the living room, and dining room, and the bedrooms. And no matter how much he pressured her, she would not buy the stupid thing after he finished, and he was immediately showed the door, with his own sweat still dripping from his body. Ted knew what a hard sale was, and this product of Mary's proved itself, again, and again, without failure. He was already planning on all the money, that was going to be had, by the Tracker. Mary and her associates, are to get 25 percent of the proceeds, and the corporation was to end up with 75 percent, and the software would sell in the millions. Mary was gathering her papers of her presentation up from the table, and Ted rose from the chair, and moved to his big oak desk.

Chapter Four

Ted was at his desk, when Mary had all her papers picked up and put back in her briefcase. Ted had just got through opening up his top drawer on his desk, pulling a envelope from it and handing it to the now standing Miss Barlow. In it Ted said, was a little advance from the business funds, for her trip to California, and also the plane ticket, in which his secretary called for, and picked up herself at the airport. Miss Barlow is to leave for California via J.F.K. airport at precisely 9:00 a.m. Friday morning ,and all the reservations for her stay at the Hilton Hotel, have been confirmed, and she would arrive a day early, to relax before the conference began. Ted and his wife would not be coming, until conference day, via corporate jet, because there was personal loose ends to tie up here, after Mary left for California. Ted said to Mary. "Take the day off, and go out shopping for your trip", in which Mary thanked him,turned and left his office, briefcase in hand. Mary had passed Ted’s secretary, who wished Mary all the success in California,on her presentation. Mary headed back to her office after passing pleasantry’s with Ted’s secretary, and poured herself a cup of coffee, in which was always brewing somewhere in the many offices of this company. She turned the pot off, and rinsed the pot out, knowing she was not going to see it for 5 days. She sat behind her desk for a minute, pondering about this morning’s events. Her mind was picking over some of Ted’s questions, not about her trip, but on her personal life, she knew it was to get her to relax, before reading her presentation. It was true that neither she, nor her brother had anyone, that they were seeing, that is to say, on a steady basis. After all who could enjoy a date, when her mind would always be on her work, and her work consumed all her time. Their apartment in Brooklyn was hardly ever used, except for sleeping, and they would only see each other occasionally, on weekends. She and her brother agreed on one thing, like many young people, there was always time later for serious dating,and that their jobs were more important now. Oh, she went out on dates, but none struck her as momentous, and no one pulled on her heart strings. And yes, there were a lot of men asking about her, but she would always turn them down, because her mind was always on something else. Her mind was set in order, get a job, make money, see the world, date, marry, have kids. She only had the first one so far, and she is busy on the second, 150,000.00 dollars a year is really nothing, in the world we are living in today. She looked up at her wall clock, coming out of her daydreams, and she saw that a half hour, already had sped away from her life! She had things to do before getting on tomorrow’s flight at J.F.K., she removed the envelope from her briefcase, and now opened it. She found her boss very generous, giving her money for the trip. She counted the bills out, and found there was 10,000.00 dollars there, and put this in her purse. She then removed the ticket from the envelope,and it had TWA written across the front, and of course a First Class seat stating, 26 window. She would be on the right hand side of the plane, toward the front of the right wing! She put this away in her purse, with a little tremble in her hands.

Chapter Five

Mary had arose from her desk, and closed her briefcase, and looked around after grabbing her purse, then putting on her coat,and making sure, that she did not forget anything. She closed her office door, and walked to the elevator, pushing the down floor arrow button, and was waiting on the car to arrive. Mary got on the car when the doors opened, and pushed the G button, for the ground floor, which the car descended smoothly. The doors opened, and Mary saw that the receptionists were at their booth, and