Page 12 of Our Radiant Embers

“How sweet of you to notice little old me at all,” I told him.

He raised an eyebrow, waiting, so I shrugged one shoulder.

“First, I started working at a pub. Then I accidentally developed a weapon with massive destructive potential and became the public front of my family.”

His attention sharpened on my face. “Accidentally?”

I hadn’t meant to let that slip, so I adjusted course. “But enough about me—let’s talk about you. So, fair enough, you visit the occasional construction site. Do you speak to any of the workers there?”

“I speak to the overseers.”

“Of course.” I nodded as though that made sense. “And they’ll definitely tell you about things like forced overtime, insufficient breaks, broken sanitation facilities…”

He wrinkled his nose, a boyish gesture at odds with his usual poise. “Seriously, what’s your obsession with this topic?”

Last time we’d argued about this, I’d omitted that my dad had used to work for them—stupidly, I’d felt like it would have put us on unequal footing. But why had I even cared? The answer, sadly, was that even in the midst of our mounting frustration with each other, I’d been aware of him.

Oh, who was I kidding? I’d been aware of him back in school, too. Everyone had been.

“My dad worked for one of your regular contractors. Unpaid overtime was expected and lunch and toilet breaks rationed.”

Incredulity twisted the corners of Adam’s mouth. “Which contractor?”

“J. Brown.”

“We’ve been working with them for decades.” His tone made it sound as though that ‌was an antidote to suspicion. Given we presently found ourselves in a near-palace that belonged to his family and I was ready to bet that ‘profit over people’ was baked into its foundation…Not so.

I stared up at him in unimpressed silence.

To my surprise, he was the one who caved first. Taking a step back, he tugged on the sleeve of his dress shirt as he turned away, voice low. “I’ll look into it.”

I blinked at his back. “Really?”

“Okay, listen.” He sat down behind his desk and shot me a dark look. “I don’t know what the hell I ever did to you, but I’m not a monster, all right? All our contractors are meant to comply with standard labour regulations. So yes, I will look into it.”

It was more than I’d expected. “Consider sending someone a little less…” I gestured at his face. “Recognisable.”

For a second, he seemed inclined to take offence. Then he huffed out a slow breath, lids fluttering shut as though he was praying for patience. Boy, he’d missed his calling as a drama actor, he really had.

When he opened his eyes again, he caught me watching him. Briefly, our gazes held.

This time, I was the one who looked away, down at the model sitting between us. “Okay, so we’ve got one week to align on a joint proposal. Shall we get started?”

Adam set the glass arrow down and took a measured sip of his coffee before he nodded. “We shall.”

* * *

Three hours later, I was seeing the error in my assumptions. It wasn’t sheer magical power or a particularly ruthless approach that made the Harringtons so successful, or at least it wasn’t just that—no, they were stubborn as hell. At least Adam was.

Since their architectural design was far more sophisticated than ours, we’d agreed to make it the basis of our joint proposal. He’d then offered to integrate our waste recycling units into the concept, taking the place of the underground incineration chambers they’d planned.

And then—a lot of no progress. Honestly, I’d prefer getting my teeth checked because at least my dentist had a sense of humour. Adam, on the other hand? He was like a child who’d never outgrown the ‘I don’t wanna’ phase.

No, our heating concept wasn’t better than theirs. No, the automated watering system for the park wasn’t necessary—we’d just have earth and water mages drop by on a regular basis. No, we didn’t need pavements that converted kinetic energy from footsteps into electrical energy.

Bloody frustrating.

I got up and scuffed a hand through my hair, just about done arguing with Adam’s rather skilled impersonation of a rock wall. “You do realise,” I told him, “that a compromise requires, you know, compromising?”

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