Page 6 of A Break in Communications

Except that she was clearly keen on getting under my skin anyway, because when the office cleared out faster at five than it had yesterday, Kelcey beaming and waving to me on her way out fully not realizing we were not friends, and also fully not realizing she’d forgotten her laptop, I’d gone to the bathroom and come back to find Lucy in my chair, arm slung over the chair back, giving me that smug smile in the low blue light from the city outside the windows.

“Just you and me now, Preston. Working late again?”

“Working on getting into my own chair… do you mind, Masters?”

She picked up my coffee cup, and I swear to god, the woman drank from it. She took a sip, set it down gently, and she looked back up at me to say, “Not terribly.”

I sighed, hard. “Do you want something, or are you just starting something?”

“Mm. Want to know what Sean was chatting with you about. Sounded like it was a big deal. Wouldn’t want to leave my favorite coworker to handle that all by her pretty little self.”

“Just some secret events I need to show my face at for company relations. Stocked with fine whiskeys, cigars, cocaine, scantily clad women, you know how it is.”

“I see now how you got on the naughty list.”

“Girl’s gotta have her vices. Get out of my chair, Masters.”

“So, Gould and Stephens, is it?”

God dammit. Of course she’d been eavesdropping… wouldn’t have put it past her to have a listening device set up in the room or something like it. “I’m going to sit down. I’d recommend you vacate my chair first.”

She uncrossed her legs, shifting back in the chair, and she patted her lap, inviting me to sit. I felt my eye twitch, but if she was going to try calling my bluff, I was calling hers. So I sat, dropping onto her lap, and I spun the chair to the computer, opening it and scanning in with my fingerprint.

“Well,” she said, her voice quieter in my ear now, “now that it’s nice and private for just the two of us, you want to tell me what’s happening with the G&S account?”

“Fuck off.” Maybe I shouldn’t have called her bluff. It wasn’t exactly comfortable, and I felt like I’d vomit with Lucy just about pressed up against my back whispering in my ear, but… I wasn’t going to be the first one to back down.

“Someone’s shy.”

“I wonder who it is, because it sure as hell isn’t me.” I tapped through my computer, trying to focus on the documents I had open—nothing connected to G&S right now, just some protocol lists I was working on—but it was hard to focus onanything other than Lucy in my chair. Was the chair even rated to hold two people?

“Shall I cut to the chase, or do you want to spend more quality time with just the two of us like this?”

“You can say or not say whatever you want, I’m ignoring you. Just let me know when you’re ready to get out of my chair, and I’m ignoring everything else.”

“The G&S account is too important to squabble over like this. Give me the documents so we can make sure it gets done right, or the inevitable department downsizing means neither of us are gaining anything out of this.”

I kept idly working at the computer as I said, “Go ask Sean for them, then.”

“I did,” she said lightly. “He said to work out a solution with you.”

That double-crossing bastard. Probably just too lazy to handle the document solutions himself, especially since I had them sent out of the usual network to a secondary address. Good thing I had, or he’d probably have just handed them all over. “Well, good luck working it out with me,” I said lightly. “Not interested. I can handle this myself.”

“I’m not leaving you alone until you hand it over.”

A twinge of irritation spiked up in my throat, and I turned back to shoot her a look, where her eyes sparkled with that self-satisfied smile this close up. I scowled. “When have youeverleft me alone, Masters?”

She smiled wider. “When you go home at night.”

“Oh, now you’re threatening to, what, follow me home? Is that within company policy?”

“No. Neither is getting into my laptop and copying my private files.”

I pursed my lips, feeling like I just needed my hands around her damn throat—she hadn’t been anywhere aroundfor that, which probably meant she had camera footage or something. Was I surprised she’d leave a secret camera to watch her computer?

“If you try to follow me anywhere—”

“Then you’ll go to Sean? What do you think he’ll say?”

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