My muscles tightened slightly.
“So he’s—what, did you say?”
“Oh, just awful, by the sounds of it. Made his money in real estate, now he buys companies and guts them—like he’s mining them, or something.”
My skin was cold beneath the quilt. That reminded me of someone. Someone I preferred not to think about.
“Miningthem?”
“Yeah. All about the profit,” she said. “You know what these douchebags are like.”
My heart started to thump.
“And you know this… ah… how?”
“Oh, we’ve been hearing his name for months, but we didn’t really believe he’d buy us.”
“No?”
My palms were sweating too, now. Perhaps this was just a coincidence.
“Maybe a big pharma giant, but not this property billionaire.” She said the last two words like they tasted bad. “Although in hindsight, it makes total sense—real estate and trauma meds, so much crossover.”
Did she justsay—
“Pixel & Grape are involved intrauma meds?” I tried to keep my voice light, but it came out as a croak.
“Pixel &Grape?” Her tone changed, then she laughed. “Oh. It’s Pixel andGrace, but I don’t workthere. I was just using the lanyard to park.”
Oh. Fuck.
Fuck fuck fuck fuckity FUCK.
“No, I work next door,” she said. “At Novexia, the pharmaceutical company. I’m in sales. Although it’s pretty much just slinging muffins and flirting with doctors.”
“You … you work at … Novexia?”
“Yup. Me and my new boss, Wilhelm von Roth.” She said it slowly. “That’s his actual name. I mean, come on. It sounds like it was designed in a lab for maximum evil.”
I tried to speak, but the words stuck in my throat.
Wilhelm vonRoth.
A name I knew only too well.
My father’s.
And also … mine.
“Anyway.” She yawned. “It’s not gonna be good. Another pale, stale male swinging his dick around the boardroom while we underlings fawn at his feet. The real one probably hasn’t twitched since the Berlin Wall came down. Can’t wait to meet him. All hail the Douche King.”
A cold sweat had broken out on my back and crept up my neck.
Say something, Liam. For fuck’ssake.
But what? Should I…tellher?
No. This could get… complicated. Fast. “Well, whatever. No point worrying about it now.” She smiled and pressed her head into the hollow between my chest and my shoulder. “Don’t you think?”
