Page 20 of Keep Your Friends Close and Your… Work Enemy Closer?

"You don't have to stay."

"I'll leave when you leave."

Did I have to pretend to leave to get him to actually leave? "No, really. I insist."

"Nope. I'm not leaving you here by yourself."

"Oh, is this some kind of chivalry thing? You're going to protect me from the big bad empty office?"

"You never know what could happen. Those rogue staplers can be pretty vicious."

I raised an eyebrow. "Rogue staplers? Really?"

He nodded, eyes alight. "You'd be surprised. One of them nearly took out my finger last week. I've got the battle scars to prove it."

"Your finger. Um, okay. I honestly don't want to know," I said, unable to suppress a small smile. "And I'm perfectly capable of defending myself against office equipment."

He leaned back in his chair, giving me a mock-serious look. "Oh, I'm sure you can. But I'd never forgive myself if something happened to you on my watch."

"Your watch? What? Are you my bodyguard now?"

"Well," he said, flashing a grin that was more annoying than charming, "someone's got to keep an eye on you. Unless you have a significant other waiting for you at home I don't know about."

A significant other? Was this Jared's way of asking if I was single? And why on earth would he want to know that?

"It's none of your business, but no. There is no significant other, and there never will be."

His brows shot up in surprise. "Never will be?"

"Never."

"No one can live up to your standards, I'm guessing."

"Damn right. And I'm quite happy being single. No one I have to listen to breathe. No one sharing annoying videos. No one next to me munching on chips. No one slurping their drink. No one pounding on their keyboard."

He gave me that feigned hurt look that I'd seen from him plenty of times before. "Well, damn, Dee. Sorry my veryexistence annoys you so much. But annoying or not, I'm staying if you're staying."

"Fine," I said, deciding not to waste any more of my time and give in to Jared's surprising stubbornness, turning back to my computer.

"Fine," he said.

A few seconds later, there was a ping on my computer indicating I had a message. I opened it to find it was from Jared. Who was still sitting right next to me. Who was also oddly quiet. Not slurping, not eating, not even typing.

I turned to glance at him but he didn't turn away from his computer. So instead I read his message.

"Attached is the info you requested on Venus La Fleur."

Huh. I opened the document to find a fully written report on the famous actress, detailing her life history, how she grew up in poverty in a rundown house, how she always dreamed of making it big in Hollywood and rescuing her family, how when she was old enough she worked odd jobs and attended acting classes at night.

Right out of high school, she moved to LA with exactly seventeen dollars to her name, working her tail off and sleeping on someone's couch. And then she finally got her big break with a small role in a low-budget film, catching the eye of a big-time agent.

Jared wrote about her wild Hollywood journey, the ups and downs, the exploitation and extreme sexism she'd encountered along the way, and how she'd triumphed through it all with sheer grit and determination, how she was an inspiration to be true to yourself despite what people say and how the masses can judge you.

When I was done reading, I realized just how well written it was. Suspicious that Jared Jawline couldn't have written this allby himself without any help, I ran the whole thing through a plagiarism check and an AI check.

But the checks came up empty. Jared had apparently completed the project himself.

"Did you read it?" he wrote another message to me, despite literally sitting right next to me still.

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