Everyone Thought She Was the Chairman's Daughter

On my first day as an intern, everyone decides Avery Hart must be the chairman's daughter.

She has his last name, expensive clothes, and no interest in correcting them.

By lunchtime, people are already treating her like she owns the place.

I came here to earn a job, not argue about someone's family tree.

Then our supervisor hands Avery the team lead role and she orders me to redo a mountain of old files and bring her coffee.

When I refuse, he takes her side.

Why is he so determined to keep her happy?

But I am the chairman’s daughter.

————————————

On my first day at Hart Marketing, I heard that the chairman's daughter was one of our interns.

I had just graduated, and I wanted this job badly enough to spend my last free weekend reading the company's campaigns.

I didn't need a shortcut. I needed a chance to show what I could do.

That was the arrangement my father and I had made before I applied: I would come in as an ordinary intern, and my work would speak for itself.

At the reception desk, a woman with a visitor badge leaned toward another new hire. 'Apparently Daniel Hart sent his daughter to work with us for a month. Can you imagine being her supervisor?'

The other woman shook her head. 'How would we even know who she is?'

'We'll figure it out.'

I kept my eyes on the stack of welcome folders.

My name was Leah Bennett.

My mother's surname had always suited me, and I wasn't going to explain my family history in the lobby.

Daniel Hart had exactly one daughter.

She was standing three feet away, waiting to collect her badge.

We were shown into a conference room overlooking a gray stretch of Chicago rooftops.

A coordinator handed out the internship schedule: four weeks of project work, then a final review to decide who stayed.

I circled the review date on my copy. For everyone else it was a date. For me it felt like a promise I had made to myself.

The seat beside mine remained empty until the coordinator began introductions.

The door opened and a young woman in a cream coat stepped inside.

The bag over her shoulder looked expensive.

So did the watch she adjusted as she took the only open chair.

'Sorry I'm late,' she said, without sounding particularly sorry. 'I'm Avery Hart.'

The coordinator gave her a folder. Someone behind us whispered, 'Hart?'

Brooke, the woman who had been talking in the lobby, leaned over the table. 'Wait. Are you related to Mr. Hart?'

Avery glanced around the room.

Everybody had stopped pretending not to listen.

Her fingers rested on the strap of her bag. 'It's a small world,' she said, smiling.

That was all. She didn't say yes. She didn't say no. Brooke supplied the rest for her. 'I knew it! My cousin said his daughter was starting today.'

The coordinator moved on to the attendance sheet, but the room had changed.

Two interns offered Avery their notes.

Another asked whether she wanted a better chair near the screen.

Avery took the notes and accepted the chair.

She never corrected a single person.

I watched her for a moment, then wrote my name across the top of the schedule.

Bennett.

Nothing about that name connected me to the man whose portrait hung in the lobby, and that was exactly the point.

At lunch, the new hires crowded around Avery.

They wanted to know whether the chairman was as demanding at home as he was at work.

Avery smiled over her salad and said, 'He expects people to deliver.' It sounded like something anybody could have said after reading the company's website.

Brooke laughed as though Avery had shared a private family secret.

I ate at the other end of the table and listened to the coordinator discuss our first assignments.

It would have been easy to say, You have the wrong person.

I could have ended the conversation before it took root.

But I had come here to work without my father's name opening every door.

Announcing it on the first day would make the month meaningless.

During introductions I noticed how carefully Avery chose her words.

When someone asked whether she had grown up in Chicago, she named a neighborhood.

When they asked if she had visited the chairman's office, she said she knew where it was.

Each answer encouraged the question without confirming anything.

It was a clever way to let other people build her story for her.

I tried to turn my attention to the schedule, but even the coordinator seemed relieved to have her among the new hires.

He offered to repeat what she had missed, while two people had arrived late before her without the same offer.

Later, I reread the first assignment twice because I had missed a line while listening to everyone speculate.

It was a simple research brief with room to propose our own approach.

That part excited me.

If we were actually measured by our ideas, I had something to contribute.

I folded the paper and slipped it into my bag instead of joining the conversation around Avery.

Avery caught me looking.

Her smile held steady as Brooke asked if she would put in a good word for anyone at the final review. 'We'll see how everyone does,' Avery said. The people around her nodded, as if she were already in charge of judging us.

I looked from Avery to the admiring faces surrounding her.

My father had sent one daughter to this internship, and it certainly wasn't her.

Since when did Dad have another daughter?