“I actually prefer tequila.” Wendy grinned.
“So he came around and he studied how to be a good father and I studied how to be a good mother and we did the Lamaze classes and ate a lot of pickles and ice cream—”
“Ha! Told you!”
“Actually, he liked the pickles a lot more than I did. And Mac was born, you were there for that, the rough patch was over, we moved on. It wasn’t the first time we fought, it’s not gonna be the last, but we got through it. And now my arms are full of flowers and I’m waiting for my son to get home. And making fun of my sister a little bit, so I’m feeling that was a good call.”
“Yeah, okay, so you’re a success story. But you seriously never thought to just let him go?”
Regan looked back at her. “Is that what you’re thinking?”
Fucking sister psychic spider-sense bullshit. “No,” Wendy replied, leaning her head back. “Maybe I should be. Maybe she’s right, it’d be best if I found someone better for me and she found someone better for her.”
“And flying cars would make road trips easier,” Regan interjected. “If you love her, you love her. You can’t just swap her out for someone you think is better suited for you. She’s it. I mean, God knows Keith isn’t perfect, but I wouldn’t trade him for…Mr. Darcy or whatever. He’s my guy.”
“Ugh…” Wendy flopped down onto the steps behind her. “You are not making this ‘getting over her’ stuff any easier.”
“Wendy Cedar, you turned your back on your inheritance, raked up a frankly unholy amount of college debt, worked as an intern, and you live in an apartment building that I am honestly not a hundred percent on letting my son visit. Because it’s what you wanted, you fought for it. Now you have this woman—and she’s definitely not good enough for you, you’re my sister—but she means enough to you that you are going—” Regan laughed “—full Enya on the emotional spectrum. And you’re not going to fight for her? Bullshit. You want my permission, you’ve got it. Go kick some ass. I’ll bail you out if you get arrested.”
And suddenly, Wendy was smiling. “You know what I need to do?”
“What?”
Wendy snatched a white rose from the bouquet. “Get her flowers.”
Wendy played with Janet’s glasses on the elevator. Janet had left a pair at her apartment—she definitely had spares, given how she hadn’t broached their inelegant silence to ask for them back—and since then they’d lived in Wendy’s jacket pocket. The longing Wendy had felt for her had been growing unendurable, but now that she’d decided to win her back, there was a sweetness to it. It felt like an itch being scratched.
The elevator dinged. She slipped the glasses back into her pocket.
The key to infiltrating someplace you weren’t supposed to be, as Wendy had learned from sneaking into horror movies from age twelve, was to look as if you knew exactly what you were doing and were absolutely where you belonged. This was hard for any twenty-something to do, but Wendy thought she had the hang of it. She went through Mary Borchard’s division like she was slightly bored of it, an everyday fixture dressed in the same slacks and Oxford shirt and sweater as everyone else. When she got to Marlon, it took him a moment to recognize her.
Marlon was a tall, springy guy with a toothbrush haircut that he either thought was cool or was waiting to loop around back to cool. He’d come up through the intern program with her and they were still friends on Facebook, right alongside everyone Wendy had been in elementary school with.
“Marlon, hey—” she said, dipping into his cubicle. It was about big enough for the both of them, which told Wendy she wasn’t overeating.
“Wendy? What are you doing here?”
“It’s a long story,” Wendy said, crouching down beside his desk. If she stood up, she was tall enough to be seen over the cubicle partitions, because apparently Mary had gotten the things secondhand from the Lollipop Guild. “But you know how I got hired by Janet Lace?”
“Yeah—what’s it like having a job? They pay you? You have insurance?”
“Yes,” Wendy agreed, trying to remember if she’d been quite so underpaid.
“You have dental? You can just go to dentists?”
“Marlon, honestly, if you help me out here, I will get you a job over in my division. Promise.”
Marlon lowered his voice. “Deal! What’s the 411?”
“The 41—never mind. My boss thinks your boss is misrepresenting the RadarVoid system, so I need a copy of all the test results on it, unedited.”
Marlon’s brow furrowed. “God…they might be on the cloud servers. No one ever deletes the old files from the draft folder—and you think Borchard is lying about this stuff?”
“Suspect.”
“Yeah, wouldn’t surprise me. The woman’s a witch, works us like dogs, doesn’t even learn our names, barely recognizes any of us. She has these nicknames and I don’t think bread rises around her.”
“What?”
Marlon was typing frantically. “You know, witchcraft? Horses sweating, cream going sour, bread not rising? I brought some creamer from home and it went sour in the office refrigerator! After one day!”
“That is definitely a Warlock or Warlock II: The Armageddon type situation,” Wendy agreed. “Found it yet?”
“Yeah, she ordered something like fifty tests done. You want all of them?”
“Each and every.”
“All right.” Marlon picked up a USB drive from his desk and plugged it in. “If there are any other files on this, don’t open them?”
“Not even a little bit,” Wendy promised.
She heard the hard drive in Marlon’s tower buzz as it started spinning, grinding the data down into the thumb drive. And then she heard heels on the hardwood floor.
Wendy threw herself under the desk as Mary Borchard leaned over the cubicle partition, staring down at Marlon.
“Bradley, where’s the JW report? I assigned it to you two hours ago. You didn’t go to lunch, did you?”
Marlon nonchalantly rolled his chair in front of his desk’s footspace. Wendy could’ve kissed him. Just not when she was under his desk.
“No ma’am—it’s Marlon, actually—and I sent the JW report to your e-mail.”
“Not finished, you didn’t include the PCS file.”
Wendy looked over at the computer tower next to her, in a special slot of the desk opposite the drawers on Marlon’s right. She could see the green light on the thumb drive blinking as it loaded. She knew the model—once the light went out, the file transfer was complete.
“I didn’t know I was supposed to include the PCS file—you didn’t ask for it, and that’s Bill’s job—”
“Should I have to tell you every aspect of your job? If I want the JW report, of course I want the PCS file too! Either have it in my inbox by the time I walk back to my office or security will be showing you the way out! They’re very good at removing undesirables from the premises.”
“Yes, ma’am, right away—”
“What’s the matter with you, anyway? You seem sweatier than usual. I’d like to think that’s all me, but somehow I doubt it.”
Wendy heard typing above her. The green light of the thumb drive was out. If she grabbed it, checkmate. Even if Mary caught her, she could smuggle it out. But if Mary caught her, noticed the thumb drive—hell, if she was smart enough to have security search her—she’d assume Janet was behind it.
Not exactly the peace offering Wendy wanted to send.
“It’s just I heard there was an opening in Upper Atmosphere,” Marlon was saying, “and I was thinking that maybe you could write me a letter of recommendation if I decided to, er, go for it.”
“I think the only thing you could get me to recommend you for is a vasectomy, but it does seem a little pointless. Are you ready to send the PCS file, or should I insult you a little more to give you time to do your job?”
“It’s sent! It’s sent!”
“Good,” Mary said, and Wendy swiped for the th
umb drive, yanking it from its USB port and jamming it under the tongue of her shoe.
“What was that?” Mary demanded.
“What was what?”
Wendy heard a few footsteps as Mary came around for a better look. “What’s under your desk?”
She pulled her hair into a ponytail, ripping an elastic from her wrist to tie it off. Slammed on Janet’s glasses. Affected a broad Jersey accent as she crawled out on her hands and knees. “Oh hi, boss lady, you must be Marlon’s boss, he talks about ya all the time—”
Mary stared in a way that made Wendy feel as if she were on a slide. “Who the hell are you? You don’t have clearance to be in here.”
“Oh, no, I’m Marlon’s girlfriend. Jocelyn? He’s mentioned me? Listen, this is super embarrassing, know I’m not supposed to be here, but it’s his birthday and I thought who’d it hurt to come over and wish him a happy birthday? Y’know? A really happy birthday?”
“Uh-huh. Get out.”
Wendy got to her feet. “I’m really sorry, Mrs. B, Marlon said you’d understand.” She put an arm around him. “I just love my little guy so much!”
Mary crossed her arms. “Well then—Marlon—since you see fit to attend to personal business on my time, I’m sure you won’t mind attending to my business on your time. Saturday and Sunday. Be here. And your friend had better be gone by the time I’ve called security. Which I’m doing right now.”
Wendy smiled ruefully at Marlon as soon as she was gone. “Sorry,” she said under her breath.
“Don’t be, I was working this weekend anyway. Plus, if anyone overheard that, I could be very popular around here.”
Wendy did think someone gave her a thumbs up as she left.
One plus to having a girlfriend, even a presently head-up-her-ass girlfriend—no more gay bars. Wendy got to meet with Tina at a café. It was nice. Quiet music, drinks with names that weren’t euphemisms for anything, actual chairs to sit in. It was like going to grandmother’s house, with bottle service.
Wendy liked it. She was getting too old to pretend to be good at dancing.
“So here’s the thing,” Wendy said, “if a guy hits on you, first you turn him down, right? See if he’s okay with rejection. Better to know that now than when he’s hitting you up for anal.”
“That’s not a real thing people do,” Tina said.
“Yes, it is, it totally works! It’s like getting a mammogram. Wouldn’t you rather know than wonder?”
“Okay, how many dates have you been on that you’re suddenly the master of relationships? That is why we’re in a place that plays actual music, right? Or did you just woman up and make peace with dying alone?”
“Does it have to be one or the other?” Wendy reached into her purse and brought out her tablet. “But let’s set aside my expertise at having sex and being in love, and go to your expertise in radar shit.”
“Whoa, whoa—” Tina held up her hands. “You know I don’t have security clearance for any of this?”
“You don’t need it. It’s proprietary technology, hasn’t been sold to the military yet. As far as they’re concerned, it might as well be Microsoft Flight Simulator.”
“That’s some flimsy shit right there.”
“Tina, c’mon, no one knows this stuff better than you. Just look it over and tell me if I’m on the right track. After you tell me which track I should be on.”
Tina groaned and took Wendy’s tablet. “You’re picking up the tab.”
“Yes. Oh hey—” Wendy slightly inclined her eyes to Tina’s left. “Hottie on your six, coming your way.”
“How would you know?”
“Just because I’m not ordering doesn’t mean I can’t read the menu. Remember, turn him down first.”
“This is stupid—”
“Trust me!”
The man put his hand on the table. “Hi there. Tom Willis. Mind if I buy you a drink, miss? You look like you’re running on empty.”
“That’s all right,” Tina said. “I’m just not in the mood right now.”
The man shrugged. “All right. Enjoy your evening.”
“Hey there,” someone said, and Wendy turned around to see a woman gesturing from the neighboring table. “If that money’s burning a hole in your pocket, I could use a refill.”
“Sure thing,” the man said, moving over. “What’ll it be?”
Wendy turned back around to find Tina glaring at her.
“Barkeep,” she called, “could I get a bottle of your finest brandy? Thanks.”
First thing the next morning, Wendy rued how fucking bright it was. But second thing, she rode to the office. “Janet, you are not going to believe—”
Her seat was taken. By Mary Borchard. “Mary. Hi there. I knew I recognized you from somewhere. ”
Wendy only let herself be abashed for a half-second. Then she slapped the tablet down on Janet’s desk. “I know what you’re up to.”
“Do you now?” Mary asked.
Wendy faced Janet. “RadarVoid works too well. It doesn’t just screw up the instrumentation of computers targeting it, it messes with everything. Other helicopters can’t engage their targets. Planes can’t accurately drop ordinance. As soon as the Hawkowl’s in the area, the entire C2 breaks down.”
Mary wasn’t fazed in the slightest. “That was a problem in initial tests, but we corrected it.”
Janet spoke for the first time. “You mean you changed the tests not to check for that. Then you mixed them all together so no one would ask why you ordered multiple series of tests.”
Mary shrugged. “So this is it, then? You found a few bugs in my program—is that really why your little helper monkey’s been sniffing around my people? Well, I’ll raise you.”
She picked up a file folder from Janet’s desk, dropped it on top of Wendy’s tablet.
“What’s that?” Wendy asked. No one answered. She reached for it—
“Don’t,” Janet said, but Wendy ignored her.
They were pictures.
Blown-up, glossy, perfect reproductions of the pictures Janet had sent to Wendy. In exchange for her fingers.
“I’m sure it would interest the higher-ups very much to know that Janet here is sleeping with someone in a different security classification. One whom she’s let run amok with proprietary technology. It really doesn’t take long to look like corporate espionage, if not counterintelligence.”
Wendy tightened her fists into neutron stars. “You wanna see counterintelligence, lady?”
Janet held up a hand and Wendy froze. “You must know this’ll come out, Mary. As soon as the military finds out the tech doesn’t work, the contract won’t be worth the paper it’s printed on.”
“But it’ll still be printed,” Mary said. “And thanks to you, Wendy, everyone will know the sale was made on the strength of the RadarVoid system. I’ve already gotten offers from Boeing and Lockheed. So years from now, when the Hawkowl is in production and I’m making eight figures at a new company, I don’t think it’ll really matter what happens to Savin Aerospace. For any of us.”
“Fuck you,” Wendy said.
Mary stared into Janet. “Is that your answer, too? Savin’s a sinking ship, but you can get in the lifeboat with me. That tablet won’t change anything, but it’s still aggravation I don’t need. Make sure no one sees it and I can get you through the door right behind me.”
Janet sat still as a statue behind her desk. It seemed to take a great deal of effort for her to rotate her chair, for her to be turning from side to side, lost in thought. And it took her a long time to raise her downcast eyes.
“You heard her,” she told Mary. “This company’s been good to me. I’ve devoted my life to it. I’m not going to help slit its throat so you can get a corner office.”
“Fine. Don’t help. Watch its throat get slit anyway.” Mary rose from her seat. “Tests that you obtained, how? And that you checked, where? I have my sources, I would’ve known if you’d gone through any of the right ch
annels. All that tablet has on it is supposition from God knows where based on God knows what, fucking up a sale that’s already being made, and no one’s going to hit the brakes on a billion-dollar contract just on your say-so. Especially once they find out you’ve been fucking the intern here.”
“Hey! I’m a structural dynamics engineer, bitch.”
Janet silenced her with a gesture. “People will listen. We’ll take this all the way to the CEO if we have to.”
“‘We’”? Mary mimicked. “I’m sure your intern is good for a lot of things, but getting a come-to-Jesus with the Old Man isn’t one of them.”
Wendy walked up to her.
“What?” Mary asked. “Are you going to hit me now? Go ahead, completely destroy your own credibility. I’ll sue you for every cent you’ve got. I can always use change for the laundromat.”
“Excuse me,” Wendy said, and stepped past her. To Janet’s desk. She picked up the phone. “Need to borrow this. Local call.” She punched in a number, fast with memorization, then waited while it rung.
Mary watched: amused at first, then impatient to see what her play was.
“It’s ringing,” Wendy said, then straightened as the other end picked up. “Hi, Grandpa? You told me to call you if I had any trouble? Well, I’m pretty sure this qualifies…”
She took two minutes to lay it out. She was pretty succinct. Mary only had time to look at Janet and ask “What the fuck is she doing?” once.
Then Wendy put her hand over the receiver and spoke to Mary. “He wants to talk to you.”
Mary reacted to the phone being held out to her as if it were a loaded gun. Then she shook her head dubiously and took it, sneering at Wendy as she lifted it to her ear. “Yes?”
The Old Man was even more succinct. A moment later, Mary lowered the phone, a dial tone issuing from it.
“I’m fired.”
Wendy took the phone from her and dropped it back in its cradle.
Mary shook her head. “That’s it? You just—you make a phone call and I’m…no, you can’t just…I have connections, I, I’m…”
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