Page 51 of Edge of Secrets

“Oh God.” Nell turned a delicate pink. “No. They didn’t.”

“Verbatim,” I said solemnly. “Swear to God.”

“I’m going to kill them.”

“It’s fine,” I said. “I actually like that you have friends who’ll make death threats for you.” With no warning, I was laughing. Then she was laughing, too. People were looking—and I didn’t care.

It felt great.

Chapter Eighteen

Nell

He kept catching my eye, giving me that wicked grin that scrambled my brain. Those deep dimples, carving sexy lines into his cheeks. He’d done it in the restaurant and made me screw up a bunch of the dinner orders. He’d done it on the drive back to his office building. And now he was doing it again, right now, from behind his desk, while I was trying to concentrate on Bruce’s game texts. I crossed my legs and tried to catch my breath. That bad bastard. It wasn’t fair.

“Nell? Earth to Nell? Do you have any of them finished yet?”

I jerked my gaze back to Bruce. “Uh, do I have what finished?”

Bruce was hanging on to his patience. “The manuscripts for the goblin caves! Did you get those done? I need to submit them to the graphic artists! Soon!”

“Ah ... um ...” I winced. What with last night’s attackers, and the police station, and the protracted bouts of incredible sex, I hadn’t had a second to work on the game. In fact, I’d forgotten about the existence of the game. “I’m so sorry, Bruce, but I?—”

“She’s been busy,” Duncan said.

Bruce’s eyes narrowed. He looked from Duncan to Nell. “Busy? With what? More than usual?”

I felt myself begin to blush. “My life’s been kind of crazy lately. If you want, I’ll try to whip something up right now.”

“Okay, but I was hoping to brainstorm about the octagonal tower and the magic mirrors right now, to get a jump on those for next week. And how about the prophesies for the cursed tomb of the lost kings? Have you started in on those yet?”

I resisted the urge to excuse myself for slacking off. “Not yet, but I have some ideas,” I said. “They’ll all need to be encrypted, though. Is the program ready?”

“I roughed out a Rosetta stone last night.” Bruce looked like he was on the edge of pouting. “We’ll be here till midnight if we want to have a chance in hell of finishing?—”

“No,” Duncan cut in. “She’s been waitressing all day, and last night, she got attacked on the street.”

Bruce looked at me, shocked. “Attacked?”

“Yeah. I was, ah, mugged,” I mumbled. “Fortunately, Duncan was there. He scared them off.”

Bruce looked at his brother. “Dude! You didn’t say anything about a battle with the forces of evil on the streets of Manhattan! Mom is going to freak!”

“Not if you don’t tell her,” Duncan said. “In any case, Nell needs dinner and rest. Plus, she has an appointment at nine in Queens. It’s not happening tonight.”

Bruce looked from him to me, and back again. Slowly, a grin spread across his face. “I see,” he said. “Does she need her beauty rest, then? So that’s the way the wind blows. That’s interesting as hell. Inconvenient. Poorly timed. But, ah … wow. Who knew.”

“Shut up, Bruce,” Duncan growled.

“I’m sorry about you getting attacked, but we have got to get some more material churned out by Monday,” Bruce fretted. “I don’t know how you expect us to?—”

“Tomorrow,” Duncan said.

Bruce rolled his eyes. “Tomorrow’s Sunday, Dunc.”

“Who cares? Work doesn’t care what day it gets done.”

“I’m free tomorrow,” I piped up quickly. “We can absolutely work tomorrow.”

---