“Just imagine when he’s the startup king of the East Coast. The man with his hands on the purse strings.” Wanda bumped Vasquez and raised her eyebrows.
“I’ll have you know I look really good sitting by the pool in the middle of the afternoon,” Linc said.
“Oh, that reminds me,” Wanda said. “Heath wants to know how you’d feel about moving to Atlanta.”
The table fell silent. The multi-sided dice tumbled out of Avery’s palm and clattered on the polished wood.
“Atlanta?” he said softly. Linc’s stomach twisted and then soured further when Avery shot him a nervous glance. He found Avery’s hand under the table and tangled their fingers together before he threw an accusatory glare at Vasquez. Her eyes widened, then rolled back in her head, before she elbowed Wanda in the ribs.
Wanda grunted. “What?” Then she gasped and her hands flew to her mouth. “Oh my God. That was really bad timing, wasn’t it?”
Vasquez raised her eyebrows at Linc, as if to sayHappy now?He squeezed Avery’s hand, waiting until his eyes lifted off the table.
“Couldn’t I stay in Seacroft?” he said with soft hope.
More stink eye from Vasquez, but she threw it in the direction of her partner, who only waved her off.
“I don’t think so,” Wanda said. “One of the reasons it’s taken us so long to start hiring for this position is Heath is super old school about managing the company finances. I think he wants someone he can look in the eye when it comes to talking numbers.”
Avery’s hand slipped out of Linc’s, making him go cold on the inside. “But I could travel? It’s not that far.”
Wanda bit her lip. “Maybe.” If travel was actually an option, she wasn’t selling it well. “But Atlanta’s great. The office is small, but everyone is really friendly. There’s a real cappuccino machine in the kitchen and an air hockey table in the board room because Heath hates meetings. It’s a ton of fun!”
“But you work from here?” Avery said.
“Yeah, but I do the coding. Even if I worked in Atlanta, I’d be holed up in a dark room with no distractions, so it really doesn’t matter where I am.”
Avery still wouldn’t look at Linc when he said, “Let me think about it.”
The game finished with Avery holding almost every coin on the table, including all the ones he’d smuggled into Linc’s pile. Apparently, that made him the winner, but no one seemed to care much at that point.
“We should go,” Linc said quietly. Avery nodded beside him, but excused himself to the bathroom.
“I am so sorry,” Wanda said as soon as he was out of the room. “I didn’t think—”
“Yeah, babe.” Vasquez crossed her arms in her chair. “You really didn’t.”
They both looked so torn up. Linc couldn’t stay mad. He pushed back from the table, and they followed him silently to the front door.
“I’ll see you at work tomorrow?” Linc said.
“Wouldn’t miss it.” Vasquez gave him a deflated smile.
Avery joined them, a bright smile pressing against his purplish face. “Thank you so much for having us over. We had a lot of fun.”
His false cheer hurt. Linc slid an arm over his shoulder. “Come on, Red.”
