by K. A. Tucker
I mock-gasp. “Oh, the horror!”
“And she flat-out refused to do dry cleaning or coffee runs, or work past four P.M.”
The crowd ahead dissipates. As much as I want to stroll right past without glancing, it’s impossible. My eyes veer toward Kyle, sitting in his chair—to his chiseled jaw and high cheekbones and his full lips, noting how much thicker and more stylish his hair looks now. He was attractive as a seventeen-year-old boy; he has become dangerously handsome as a man.
And his steady gaze is on me.
“Come on, Piper . . . help me out,” David whines. “Just for the week.”
“A minute ago, it was for the day!” This is so David, asking for an inch, then reaching for a mile, as if he’s entitled to it. “Ask Greta to help you out.”
“Are you kidding? Greta doesn’t have time. Plus, Kieran doesn’t share well.”
“Neither do I, so you had better hire someone soon.”
David curses under his breath.
“You know you’ve done this to yourself,” I lecture. There’s been a steady trickle of potential executive assistants passing through his office door, courtesy of Human Resources’s efforts. All vetted, all with extensive experience.
And all problematic, according to David.
“What’s with you lately, Piper?”
“What are you talking about?”
“I mean, you’ve been in a fucking mood for the past two weeks.”
“There’s nothing wrong with my mood,” I hiss, feeling Kyle’s and Gus’s attention on us as we bicker not five feet away.
David drops his voice. “Is this because I’m seeing other women? You’re the one who told me to go out and find someone. You’re the one who ended our engagement, remember.”
I roll my eyes. “I don’t care who you’re with. Stop making this about us, David.”
“Isn’t it, though?”
“No! It’s about you finding an assistant so you stop torturing mine. You’ve been a complete dickhead to him since day one.”
“Okay, seriously, Piper? I’m on my knees begging you for just a bit of help so I can nail this project down for your company, and you’re calling me names? This is what we’ve come to?” He swipes his badge over the scanner and shoves through the security barrier in a huff, without so much as a nod toward Gus, whose eyebrows are raised.
And I’m left standing awkwardly in front of Kyle, suddenly feeling like the bad guy.
Kyle curiously watches David’s retreating back a moment before focusing on me. He’s not actually buying David’s sob story, is he?
“He broke Mark’s windmill!” I blurt out, as if that explains everything.
The corners of Kyle’s lips twitch. “Have a great day, Miss Calloway.”
I sigh heavily. Strangers it is. I pass through the security gate, feeling his penetrating gaze on me the entire way.
What is he doing?
My gaze trails Kyle’s graceful stride as he strolls along the corridor at a leisurely pace, casting nothing more than a perfunctory glance my way. That’s the second time today—fifth time this week—that he has walked by a meeting room I’ve been in. Did Ivan patrol the floors like this, too? If he did, I never noticed him. It’s a bit ridiculous, really. I might understand the need for security patrols during the dead of the night, but it’s ten A.M.
Mark’s elbow gently nudges my arm, pulling my attention back.
To the four sets of eyes steadily watching me.
“Tripp’s recommending we go with KDZ for the construction of the Marquee,” Mark murmurs softly, a prompt for what I missed while ogling our new security guard.
I feel my cheeks flush as I quickly scan the proposal in front of me again. “I’m sorry, who? We’re using Jameson for the Marquee. Who the hell is this KDZ Construction Company, anyway?”
“They’re from Boston, but they’ve recently expanded into the area. They come highly recommended, and their contract will be competitive.” Tripp smooths his tie down over his belly as he recites what sounds like a planned response. “I’ve been in talks with them about the Marquee for months now.”
I feel my eyes widen. So Tripp has gone from telling the engineers not to bother with the project to now being highly involved, and with a construction firm that he’s never mentioned lined up?
What the hell is going on?
When was he planning on looping me in?
“Well, we’re ready to sign on with Jameson, who has a proven track record with us. So why on earth would we back out now? Especially when we’re already behind?”
“You demanded that we tighten the timeline by almost three months. KDZ can deliver on that. They’re already working on their proposal. I’m meeting with their president on Friday to review and make the decision.”
Tripp has no business offering up a construction contract without approval from both me and my father, and he knows it.
I bite my tongue before I blurt as much out in front of the broader group, and force a patient tone. “As I’ve said, we are ready to proceed with Jameson, but I’m willing to review this proposal once you have it—”
“Kieran’s already given KDZ the go-ahead. If you don’t like it, you’ll need to take it up with him.” Tripp heaves his body out of his chair. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have another meeting to attend.” He strolls out the door, but not before I catch the smug curl of his lips.
It takes everything in me to school my expression, even as I feel heat crawling up my neck. “Mark will send the follow-ups. See you all on Thursday.” I wait until everyone has left the room and the door is shut before I snap.
“When’s my father back from LA?”
“Thursday, I think. Hold on.” Mark is frowning as he madly types an instant message to Greta. “Yeah. His plane lands at five P.M.”
I’ll have to call him about this. I hate confronting my father over the phone. He’s that much more abrupt.
I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Son of a bitch.” I’m not quite sure who deserves the title more. Is this another one of Tripp’s dick moves to save face and make me look like the fool? Or should the blame land squarely on my father’s shoulders this time? “What do I have next?”
“A meeting with David and Jim.”
“Great. Just what I need right now. Another pompous ass to deal with,” I mutter.
Mark tucks his laptop under his arm. “You okay?”
I sigh, collecting my things. “Yeah.”
“You sure?” he presses, making me wary.
“Why are you asking?”
“Nothing. Just . . .” He shrugs. “You’ve seemed, I don’t know, not yourself lately. Distracted.”
First David accusing me of being in a mood, and now Mark? I duck my head as I collect my things, mainly to hide another flush of my cheeks. “I just have a lot going on right now. You know, the Waterway project . . .” Lie. “The Marquee.” Lie. “And this ongoing Tripp bullshit. It’s getting worse.” Partial lie.
Technically, all those things are real and should be dominating my focus and raising my stress levels. Should is the operative word. But the truth is, if I’m distracted, it’s because my attention keeps getting snagged on the new security guard, my thoughts lingering in the past.
Mark nods slowly, as if understanding. “Håret i postkassen.”
“Pardon me?”
He offers a shy smile. “Just something my grandmother used to say. It’s a Danish proverb. It means ‘you’ve got your hair stuck in the mailbox.’ ”
“What?”
He smiles. “You’ve found yourself with a tricky problem.”
“Oh. With Tripp? Yeah, I guess I have. I just don’t know what to do about him. He’ll clearly never accept me as his superior.”
“Få hul på bylden.”
I wait with raised eyebrows for the translation.
Mark shrugs. “ ‘You’ve got to lance the boil.’ ”
I cringe at the mental image that spurns. “So your grandma thi
nks that if I poke Tripp with a long, sharp needle, he’ll go away?”
He chuckles. “He’d learn to keep his distance.”
“It would definitely make me feel better.” I sigh, hauling my weary body out of my chair.
“Off to lunch, Miss Calloway?” Gus asks as he tosses his Alejandro’s hamburger wrapper into the trash behind him. The man rarely leaves the desk, even to eat.
“And a meeting.” I don’t mean to sigh as I take in the empty chair next to him, but it slips out anyway.
“You just missed him. He went to check something in the parking garage.”
Of course he did. My gaze drifts to the bank of monitors behind the desk, to the screens showing the elevators. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what’s happening.
We’re at week three and Kyle is outright avoiding me now, bolting the second he spots me on my way down. Off to test an alarm or patrol the building or to pee. Anything to not have to see me, it seems.
My annoyance flares, but I push it aside. “How’s it going so far with him?”
“No complaints. He’s punctual, disciplined, quiet. Takes his job seriously.”
Not at all like the version I knew. “Good. Well . . .” Loitering here talking about Kyle feels awkward. “I’ll see you later.” I turn to leave.
“I heard he requested a transfer here, from San Diego,” Gus says.
San Diego. So that’s where he went. Has he been there all this time?
I feel Gus’s steady gaze on me, as if waiting for my reaction.
“Makes sense. Lennox is a great city. I could see why he’d make the move,” I say casually. Why did he make the move? For his girlfriend, maybe?
“Not this city. This building,” Gus clarifies, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “Apparently, he’s been trying to get in here for a while now. Put in a transfer request with Rikell’s HR for this building.”
I frown. “How many buildings in the city does Rikell do security for?”
“Fifteen. Twenty. Something like that.” Gus’s eyes study me as I try to process this bit of information.
If it were Lennox that Kyle wanted to move to, he’d accept a transfer at any of those buildings. So why did he want to work at this one specifically?
Unless . . .
“There must have been something about this place that made him want to come here,” Gus says, as if reading my mind.
“The architecture,” I murmur absently, more confused now than before.
Something.
Or someone.
“Yes. The architecture.” A knowing glimmer shines in Gus’s eyes, but his brow is pulled with worry. “Anything I should know about?”
What would Gus say if he knew everything about Kyle that I know? If he knew our entire history?
Would he be so quick to throw out kind words about him?
“Yes. There is.” I lean in, as if to share a secret. “These burgers are terrible for you. Start eating healthier.”
His laugh trails me as I head for the exterior doors, my mind swirling.
Why would Kyle make the effort to move across the country to work in my building, only to then keep me at arm’s length?
What the hell are you up to, Kyle?
Chapter 10
THEN
2006, Camp Wawa, Week One
“Okay! So we all learned something important from last night’s fiasco,” Darian begins, having corralled the entire staff of counselors to the field beside the pavilion. Meanwhile the campers are suitably distracted with pancakes and sausages, and grossly exaggerated versions of the vampiric, winged beast that tried to kill the occupants of Cabin Nine.
She pauses to look around the group, her index fingers pointed outward. It’s her signature move before she asks for audience participation. “Who can tell me what it was?”
“Don’t run into a cabin full of sleeping kids screaming, ‘Run for your lives before the bat kills you!’?” Colin, a tall dark-haired guy, calls out. All the counselors laugh.
All except Christa.
“I did not say that!” she bursts with indignation, her face heating to match the color of her camp T-shirt. “That’s not what happened.”
“No. Well, yes, Colin, technically, you’re not wrong—you should never say anything along those lines. And perhaps there might have been a more orderly way of waking the children to deal with last night’s situation,” Darian hazards, lifting her hand in the air to stall Christa’s next words of defense.
The first eardrum-splintering shriek had come within seconds, as little Teegan looked up to see the wiry black body cowering in the corner directly above her head, a mere two feet away. A chorus of shrill screams soon joined in, as we scrambled to pull all five girls sleeping on top bunks down, to take cover below.
The next few anxiety-laden seconds felt like they were happening in slow motion, as the bat lifted off and fluttered around the cabin for a few laps before swooping toward Christa. Armed with our pillows, we took turns swinging at it until finally it sailed through the open door and toward the trees.
But the damage had been done—ten terrified little girls who took hours to drift off once again, along with disturbed rest for the ninety other female campers who were awoken by the high-pitched alarm. Plus Darian, of course, came speeding across the campgrounds in a golf cart—dressed in an Elmo nightshirt and hiking boots, her short blonde hair standing on end—to find out what was going on.
“Let’s take this as an opportunity to remember to shut your cabin door fully when you’re going to the restroom at night, okay?” Darian says. “Simple mistake, I get it! But guess what, everyone? We’re in the woods, and bats live in the woods! It’s part of nature. It’s fine. We can coexist in harmony, as long as they don’t get into our cabins.”
My eyes flash to Christa before averting them to the grass. When Darian asked for a rundown of exactly what happened, I was bracing myself for trouble. I assumed Christa would rat on me for sneaking out to meet up with Kyle.
But instead, she went along with the lie, nodding vigorously when I explained that I saw the bat fly in just as I was coming back. Maybe she felt partly responsible, because she’s the one who left the door open. Either way, at least she didn’t throw me under the bus the first chance she got.
There’s another dramatic pause from Darian, another index-finger point. “And why don’t we want bats in our cabins at night, besides the obvious creepiness?”
Avery lets out a yelp and then, “Ew . . . gross, Eric!” Heads spin to see Eric hovering over her shoulder from behind, a frothy white substance dripping from his mouth and onto her shirt. There’s another round of laughter around the group.
“Because bats carry rabies,” Kyle offers innocently, as Eric holds up a can of whipped cream and then swallows. And grins at Avery.
“How did you get . . .” Darian shakes her head. “Never mind. Yes, Kyle, you are correct. Bats can carry rabies, and while the cases are rare, we can’t have bats hanging around our sleeping kids. Bats have very small teeth and it’s possible the kids won’t realize they’ve been bitten, especially as deep as they sleep after their days here. We’re feeling pretty confident that none of the girls came into contact with our furry little friend last night thanks to quick action by our counselors—”
“Run for your lives!” that Colin guy calls out.
“But,” Darian spears him with a warning glare, “had they not noticed it right away, it would have spent all night in there with them.”
I shudder at the thought.
“Then we’d be dealing with a very different situation, involving calls home and a lot of shots. So please remember, keep your cabin doors closed, report any tears in the window screens, and let’s all start doing visual checks around our cabins before lights-out from now on, just to be on the safe side. Okay, everyone?”
Mumbled agreement sounds.
“Great. Also . . . I happened to notice that one of our golf carts was missing last night. Y’all know that the
golf carts are not to be used at night for anything except emergencies. I’m not aware of any other emergencies last night, so whoever forgot that rule and borrowed it,” her sharp blue eyes float between Eric and Kyle, who are studying their shoes, “please don’t do it again. Okay!” Darian claps her hands. “Time to finish up with breakfast and get a move on! It’s gonna be another hot, sunny day!”
The counselors disband at a leisurely pace, the promise of sweltering heat not as motivating as Darian seems to think it should be.
Kyle hangs back to fall in line with me, his walk more a swagger, his thumbs looped casually into his shorts pockets. “Sounds like you had way more fun than I did last night.”
“If that’s what you want to call it.” My eyes are sore from lack of sleep and I’m sure my bags match the ones under Christa’s. “I tried to sneak out after Christa fell asleep.”
His chest lifts with a deep sigh of relief. “That makes more sense,” he murmurs, and then smiles.
I frown. “More sense than what?”
He shrugs, nudging his shoulder against mine. “I thought maybe you changed your mind.”
“About what? Jumping off a cliff at night?” I mock-gasp. “Never.”
He dips his head, and a shy smile touches his lips. “That, or . . . I don’t know, about this?”
This being us.
I can’t help but laugh at the suggestion. Does Kyle not feel my gaze glued to him whenever he’s in my line of sight? Does he not notice the stupid grin that takes over my face every time our eyes meet?
He lets out a soft chuckle and then shrugs. “I don’t know. I was standing there, waiting for you, and I started thinking, and . . . yeah . . .” Beautiful molten eyes meet mine again, and in them I see a vulnerability I hadn’t before. Or perhaps it wasn’t there before. Perhaps it took him standing on the path in the dark, waiting for me, for doubt to seed itself.
Had our roles been reversed, had I been the one waiting, and he didn’t show . . . A hollow pang stirs in my stomach with just the thought. And that tells me two things: one, that I’m already falling hard for Kyle.