Oh, who am I kidding? There was exactly zero chance I was going to stand up to Nick with the entire executive suite watching. Talk about making a scene. The truth is, the only times I’ve managed to hold my ground were when I was furious and the words tumbled out of their own volition.
Which is the opposite of standing up for yourself and setting healthy boundaries.
I should text Sofia. She’d know what to do. Of course, then I’d have to tell her I slept with Nick, so maybe I’ll just hold that thought for now.
“It’s a damn shame that man is so cold,” Jonathan says, his nasally voice breaking into my thoughts. “He might be fine as hell, but mark my words, that one’s not worth the emotional energy it would take to break down his walls.” He shivers. “I pity the fool who tries.”
I straighten, turning his words over in my head. Is it possible he knows about last night? Jonathan’s never shown interest in Nick before. From what I’ve observed, he’s done his best to avoid him. Like I used to. More importantly, could he be right?
No.
The answer comes firm and fast.
Nick might be distant at times, but he’s not without his reasons. And despite the cool demeanor, he’s not without feeling, either. When he talked about his parents’ deaths, about Mama Hart’s adoption, there’d been a depth of feeling in his words I’ve never heard before. No one who truly knew him could doubt that he feels things deeply, even if he does his damnedest to hide it.
Anyone who’d endured such hardships—such horrors—at a young age would be shaped by them. Hardened. And yet he’d still allowed himself to fall in love once.
Only to be betrayed.
My heart aches at the knowledge.
Talk about a gut punch. You finally open up to someone, fall head over heels in love, and they betray you in the worst possible fashion. Is it any wonder he prefers to keep things strictly physical now? No one in their right mind would sign up for that kind of heartache twice. I certainly wouldn’t.
Guilt niggles at my conscience. Given how poorly things ended with his ex, maybe I should tell him about the suggestion box. And my capstone project. What we share might be sex only, but even that requires a certain amount of honesty, doesn’t it?
“What was that all about?” Rebecca asks, tiptoeing across the reception area with an eye to the closed office door. “Do you think everything’s okay?”
She looks nervous. Like she might be the one who did something wrong.
I shrug. “Whatever it is, I doubt it has anything to do with us.”
I have no actual basis for making this claim, but Nick’s not exactly known for holding back, so it seems like a sound bet.
Jonathan rolls his chair over to my desk, grinning like the cat who ate the canary. “Beck wasn’t supposed to be working in this office today,” he says, clearly enjoying the fact that he knows something we don’t. “The last time they had an emergency meeting of the minds, it was because someone in R&D was selling Triada code on the dark web.”
Rebecca gasps and crosses her arms over her stomach.
“I’ll bet someone gets fired by the end of the day.” Jonathan’s grin widens at the prospect of juicy new gossip. “And we’ll be the first to know.”
“Nick has meetings booked all morning,” Rebecca says, her gaze sliding from Jonathan to me. “Should I cancel them?”
Before Jonathan can answer, I cut in. “Why don’t we take it hour by hour? For all we know, this won’t take long.”
What I don’t say is that with their busy schedules and the Epos launch in eleven days, it’ll be a headache to reschedule everything.
“I’d better go call his nine o’clock,” Rebecca says, turning back to her desk.
I sneak one more glance at Beck’s door, curiosity nipping at my thoughts.
Don’t even think about it.
Right. I’ve got my own work to worry about. And I’ll need to squeeze in a walk for Oreo later this morning. I unhook her leash, and she flops down on the floor, apparently content to nap for the time being.
Thirty minutes later, I’m up to my eyeballs in expense reports when my cell rings.
I glance at the screen and see my grandmother’s face smiling up at me. Normally I wouldn’t take a personal call from my desk, but it’s so unusual for her to call me on a weekday that I pick up.
“Hi, Gram. Is everything okay?”
