"You're in my office. I'll stay, thanks," Ash replied.
"We have nothing to talk about," I gritted out. Ash was staring at me and hoping for some kind of explanation, I knew this, but I couldn't offer him that yet. That would come later, when I'd fixed this.
"We have everything to talk about, Rose," Denis replied. "What were you thinking, going off on your own? This isn't good for you. It's notsmart." He blinked at the modern office space like it was a cold, empty shell not unlike his impression of my brain. "Did you really think you'd be able to do this? By yourself?" Not waiting for a response, he continued, "Come along. We'll go home where you belong. Where you're needed. We'll forget about all this nonsense and get back to our routine."
"I am not going anywhere with you. Not now," I said. "Not ever again."
Denis pressed his teeth into his top lip as he chose his response. "This isn't the time to let your emotions get the best of you, Rose. Call up some maturity, would you? You know I don't appreciate when my girlfriend acts like a child in front of others."
"I amnotyour girlfriend," I replied. "I have nothing to say to you. We're finished."
"Now that's not true and you're well aware of it," Denis said in that lofty, professorial voice he'd cultivated while I'd juggled jobs to cover our rent. "Please, Rose. Stop making a fool of yourself. I haven't the time for your juvenile games."
"Watch yourself," Ash growled.
"I know you think that's going to shut me up because it's worked all the other times you've thrown those words in my direction," I replied. "But it's not working anymore. I've given you enough of my time. You should leave."
"Yes, you should," Ash said.
Denis ran a hand over his thin, straw-colored hair as he stared at me, his lips parted and his jaw working as he searched for a sharp response. Those didn't come quickly to him. Eventually, he said, "I'm unimpressed with your behavior today but I do require a minute, Rose, as you have something of mine." He glanced at Ash. "In private. At the minimum, you owe me that much for everything I've done for you."
I didn't understand how I'd wasted years of my life on this man. How I'd ever looked at him and thought,this guy is going places and I want to go there with him. More than that, I didn't understand how I'd accepted the ever-shrinking box he'd fashioned for me without complaint.
"I owe you nothing," I said. "You shouldn't have come here. I don't even understand how you found me."
Denis held out his hands, offered a stiff shrug. "You really must learn how the world works, Rose. Airline tickets, credit cards, cell phone tower pings, email logins. Very simple to track."
I stomped my foot on the floor. "How did you find mehere?"
"You really don't understand anything, do you?" he mused.
"What did you say?" Ash boomed. "No, don't repeat it. Just get the hell out of my office."
Denis eyed Ash again, this time with unshuttered suspicion. If I had to bet on it, I'd say he was trying to figure out what Ash was getting from me. There was no other purpose to keeping me around.
Denis replied, "All I had to do was ask my brother to run some checks down at the station. Your new boss doesn't waste any time getting you paid, does he?"
That damn cop brother of his. There wasn't an ethical bridge he wouldn't burn. The arson extended to legal bridges as well.
"Since you weren't returning my texts or calls," Denis continued, "I had to come here for myself. Considering you left town in such a rush and with some critical documents in hand, you left me no choice."
"That's not true," I argued. "I have no reason to keep a single thing of yours."
Denis brought his fingertips to his forehead and muttered a string of ripe profanity, banishing the refined professor act as he curled his hands into fists. It was then I realized this manscaredme. Perhaps it hadn't always been that way and perhaps I'd felt this cold tingle before but I'd scribbled over that reaction and renamed it something more innocuous, something less dangerous. He'd been passionate and zealous, short-fused and sensitive. He was a whirlwind, a great, dusty mess of a man. And I'd believed him every time he insisted I didn't comprehend, I wasn't intellectual, I didn't have the acuity for academic work. Oh, and by the way, did I mind gathering all his research, revising all his work, and ultimately drafting his papers for him? Because those little things would really help and what good was I if I couldn't at leasthelphim with the enormous undertaking of it all?
Denis was all of these grand and overpowering things, and I couldn't bear the sight of him anymore because he'd used it against me and then he'd usedme. I didn't know much for sure but standing in front of a person who borrowed the most advantageous bits of you for his personal benefit while you both knew the truth was almost as awful as letting yourself be used in the first place.
"She asked you to leave," Ash said. "She was more courteous than required." He reached for the telephone on my desk, tapping out an extension before leveling Denis with a glare. "I'm not asking and the security officers won't be courteous."
Ash kept that glare on Denis while he spoke in hushed tones to the security office. I could feel Denis's temper sparking and everything inside me screamed to move, to go, to get the hell out of the way before he blew up. I knew what that was like and while he had never put a hand on me, words had the power to be just as violent as fists.
But I couldn't move. I wasn't convinced I could breathe.
Ash dropped the headset into the cradle. "You have about ninety seconds to leave before you're forcibly removed. I'd recommend you take this time to exit my office and this building, and never contact Miss Besh again unless you'd like to find yourself the recipient of a restraining order."
I knew the minute the tide turned in Denis. I'd seen it a hundred times if I'd seen it once. The professorial demeanor vanished and in its place was an irritable man who felt the world owed him everything. "This doesn't involve you," he snapped at Ash. "I didn't invite you into this conversation but since you're here, you should know she lied to you. She doesn't know shit about accounting."
"You're vitally incorrect on each of those four points," Ash replied. "Not that I could take you seriously when you've spent the past five minutes on blatant intimidation moves."
