It looked like hers. The same neat lines I’d seen before in the elevator, when she scrambled to escape after realizing her mistake and frantically pushed the button that would let her off on the next floor. The same tattoo I’d brushed with my thumb when I helped her gather papers that had fallen to the floor after a coworker had bumped into her. One who, when seeing me, had bolted, leaving her to clean up the mess alone.
Her startled look when I murmured the translation, proving I knew exactly what those zeros and ones meant, while trying to ignore the heat from our brief touch.
But here in the shadows and the dim light, I couldn’t be certain. I told myself it could be someone else, some stranger who wore the same type of script on her skin.
Except in my gut, I already knew better.
MIRA.
Damn it all to hell.
I should have stepped away and led her back to her friends, who, with the clues falling into place, had to be Micah and his husband if I didn’t know better. What the hell was Micah doing bringing Mira to a place like this? She was so far over her head and out of her league.
Instead, I’d given her my card. Told her if she wanted to silence the voices in her head to reach out when all I wanted to do was push her against the wall and taste her.
God help me, I was her boss, and never had I mixed work with pleasure. I’d kept those two areas of my life separate, but since the day in the elevator months ago, I’d wanted to drag her straight into mine.
Maybe I’d have my chance after all.
I pinched the bridge of my nose, resisting the urge to throw Stan out the fucking office window. Thirty floors up—that’d probably be frowned upon by the investors. Still, it would make my day.
“She’s insubordinate,” Stan snapped. “She hacked our system and—” He gestured wildly at my screen, as if piling on charges might save him.
I cut him off with a glance at Victor, my Chief Security Officer, sat back in his chair, mouth curved in that smug way that saidwe’ve already decided how this plays out. We had. We’d spent half of yesterday mapping out our plans for Ms. Rhodes.
I pushed to my feet and crossed to the window. Floor-to-ceiling glass spilled the city at my feet, but it did nothing to steady me. My reflection glared back—sharp edges, a man who controlled everything but his own thoughts. Because all weekend, she hadn’t left them.
The girl at Sanctum.
The one I waspretty damn surewas Ms. Rhodes herself.
Elisa, my temporary assistant, popped her head through the door. “Mr. Reid, Ms. Rhodes says HR sent her up to see you?”
I turned and nodded, waving her off. How many times had I told her not to bother me in the middle of a meeting? She’d been here for two weeks, and I wasn’t sure she knew where the mail room was, but the way she flirted with everyone who had a cock told me everything I needed to know about her.
Easy wasn’t something I did. Never had. I craved control, and girls like Elisa weren’t my thing.
“You can go,” I said, then shifted my glare to Stan. He needed to leave before I started asking how this clause had slipped pasthim. How he hadn’t known even though he'd been the one to bring it to us in the first place. That reckoning would come later.
“As her immediate supervisor, I should be included in her termination.” He rose, a smug expression plastered across his face.
Ethan strolled in behind him, chuckling. Stan blinked at the three of us, confusion flickering.
I stepped closer, close enough he had to crane his neck to look at me. “She caught what you missed. What youshould havecaught. Tell me, Stan, why should I let her go and keep you? After you vouched for this company."
He paled. “I… ah…”
Victor rose from the couch. “You should go, or I can skip to the part where security will be seeing you out.”
Stan squared his jaw, trying for composure he didn’t have. His gaze darted back to me.
I gestured to the door. “Do what he says. I’ll be in touch.”
Stan hesitated. He wanted to argue, but self-preservation won out. He spun on his heel and left. We’d deal with him later.
Analysts didn’t usually get pulled into things this early, but I’d been dealing with everything except my own company for months, and somehow it hadn’t set off any red flags because Stan had handled the last few contracts we’d signed.
Right now, I need to deal with Ms. Rhodes.
