Page 13 of A Break in Communications

She settled in at her seat, tapping the egg with her fork. Making sure I cooked it right. As if I wouldn’t when it was for Anna Preston. “I might take neat espresso with my breakfast.”

“Every time you come in with your own coffee in the morning, it’s a cappuccino.”

She arched her eyebrows at me again. “Staring at me every time I come in, Masters?”

“Better be used to it. Everyone’s going to be staring at you when you go in today dressed like that.”

“Uh-huh. Hm. Thanks for the breakfast, I guess. I didn’t know you knew how to cook.”

She complimented me. Couldn’t have been less direct, but she complimented me. I thought I’d pass out. I sat down at my own chair across from her, my breakfast a little colder than hers by now, but as long as Anna Preston had her breakfast hot and ready the way she liked it, all was well in the world. “Of course. I cook for my grandmother. Or should I say, my husband?”

She looked away, a pink flush creeping in over her cheeks. She always did that when she got something wrong—which was so rare as to be a little treat seeing this, avoiding eye contact, shifting how she sat, that cute little blush. “Look, I apologize for having assumed.”

“Aw, well, if we’re all apologizing and moving on, then I forgive you, sweetheart.”

She wrinkled her nose, picking up her coffee. “Maybe I should wonder if you poisoned this.”

“I even made sure I made it with your favorite coffee beans, and you still can’t thank me?”

She faltered. “Ah…”

“Your mother would be very disappointed, I’m sure.”

She snorted, hanging her head, and it was a small wonder I didn’t scream and jump up and down at making Anna Preston laugh. “Really?” she said drily. “I’ll tell Mom?”

“Mm. She clearly thinks very highly of us both.”

She took a second summoning up her force of will, and she strained a smile at me. “Thank you for breakfast, Lucy,darling.”

I saw the gates of heaven. My brain short-circuited, and the only thing present in my mind was aimless screaming. I kept myself from falling out of my chair and having a few heart attacks on the floor, and I smiled flawlessly back at her. “You’re very welcome, darling.”

“Ugh.” She broke, going back to her food, but I was pretty sure it was a little smile at the corners of her lips.

Ah, god, she was beautiful.

Luckily I always kept a change of clothes and some makeup in my car—I’d learned the hard way from a mortifying coffee spill early on in my career—so I was able to go grab them from the trunk and go back to take a shower, since Anna was kind enough to let me back inside. Just a regular workday outfit, nothing on the level of Anna Preston in that dress, but not in a million years would I be mad enough to think I could match her anyway. I took a minute applying a little more makeup than I usually did, and when I stepped out of the bathroom, I leaned against the wall at the end of the hall, flicking my hair back and getting a look from where Anna was packing her bag up.

“What, are you expecting camera flashes?”

“How do I look?”

“Ah…” She looked me over once, and turned back to her bag. “Hideous. You look like you just stumbled in half-starved from the wilderness.”

“Oh, perfect. That’s the hot look right now. Let me know if you need some style tips.”

She rolled her eyes, but Iswearshe was smiling a little. Maybe it was wishful thinking. “Go to work, Masters. We’re not driving together.”

“Oh, we’re not? Carpooling is so environmentally responsible, you know.”

“You are not leaving your car at my apartment. Go…” she started, punctuating each word as she closed compartments on her bag, “to… work.”

And maybe it was fate that, even though we were environmentally wasteful and didn’t drive together, we arrived at the office at the same time, Anna’s car pulling into the lot behind me, and I may have dawdled a little bit at the elevator so that the doors would open right as Anna was coming into the hall behind me. I stepped in, leaning in the doorway to keep the doors open, and she rolled her eyes as she stomped inside, shoulders hunched, hands in the pockets of her sleek black coat.

“Get a personality outside of me, Masters.”

“I do. Together with my loving husband.”

“Shut your mouth.”

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