Page 38 of Ice Cold, Red Hot
He stepped out of the office in the back, a cup of coffee from the campus coffeehouse in hand. “Wasn’t sure how you took it. Black? You seem like you’d take your coffee black.” He handed it to me.
“Um. Thanks.” There was something up. He was chipper,overeager. Still smug, but there was something else going on.
“I had a feeling you’d be in early. You’re the kind of girl who works hard. Puts in the time. My instincts were right on target.” He gave me a grin that suggested anything I did well was somehow thanks to him thinking I’d do well. I didn’t like it, but now wasn’t the time to cause waves. I’d done enough of that lately.
“You can put your things down here,” Ethan said, gesturing to a terminal. “I know Daria got you briefed in, but I made this for you too.” He pulled a binder from a spot next to the computer as I hung my bag on the back of the chair and deposited the coffee on the desk.
“What’s this?” I flipped through the pages of the binder, which had my name on the outside and contained a highlighted schedule and an indexed collection of pertinent research. It was something I’d intended to make myself. I lifted my gaze to Ethan.
He smiled sweetly, turning my stomach. “Fast-track grad students get fast-track support.”
What the hell?
I’d hope to come in early, get some actual work done, and have some time to unfuck my head. But as I sat down, shaking the mouse to bring the screen to life, Ethan pulled a chair up next to mine.
“I’ll just walk you through some of the ongoing experiments, and highlight the protocols I’m really focused on.”
Which was exactly what Daria had already done, but I held my tongue and let Ethan step me through the basics all over again. He leaned close as he pointed out specific items on the screen and showed me the file structure for the lab.His scent—some kind of cologne and lingering coffee—wafted past me and I worked hard not to breathe through my nose.
“You’re not drinking your coffee. Did I get it wrong?”
“No, no. It’s good.” It was just that I had come in early hoping for my own space. Time to get a coffee on my own. The way I liked it—with oat milk and Splenda. To have time to think. This was… unpleasant.
Luckily, when the others began arriving, Ethan rose and headed back into his office, calling out, “briefing at ten, Celeste.”
Daria raised an eyebrow as she sank into the chair at the next terminal, and I had a feeling she knew exactly what had just gone on. “Don’t come in early,” she suggested.
“I won’t do it again.” What the hell had I gotten myself into?
Things didn’t get better at the briefing.
We were seated around a laminate table: me, Erin the senior undergrad, Marcus the second-year, and Daria, the other female grad.
Ethan gave Erin a nod—she began with the survey response rates and data accuracy. Then he turned to me.
“Celeste, walk us through the behavioral logs you reviewed last night from our existing data.”
My throat caught, but I forced the words out cautiously. “I noticed a cluster of scores flagged for impulsivity. Specifically that subject #47 showed his reaction time drop sharply after being asked to recall emotionally stressful events.”
Ethan’s eyes flicked to mine. “That’s interesting.” Then he leaned forward, addressing the group.
“And that ties directly into my work on emotional-control decline. Specifically, if teams are pushing athletes too far after a concussion, braking response suffers. That’s a pattern we noticed in football; now we’re seeing it in hockey. It’s a connection the data has increasingly supported, and it’s glaringly obvious if you know what you’re looking for.”
I swallowed hard. Why had he made me report the findings if they were so obvious? Ethan had just belittled me in front of my new colleagues and it took everything in me not to lash out. But I couldn’t lose this opportunity. I nodded, as if he’d just said something brilliant.
“Marcus, tell us what you were mentioning to me last night.”
Marcus cleared his throat. “I think—maybe—if we adjust the emotional-stimulus delay, we’d get clearer results.” He didn’t sound certain even though what he was saying was completely obvious.
Ethan smiled and nodded at Marcus. “Right. That’s solid. Good observation.”
I looked between them. What? Marcus states the obvious and gets praise. I point out a glimmer of correlation that took more than two thousand data points to become clear and Ethan takes credit?
My eyes found Daria’s and she nodded. Barely.
So it wasn’t just me seeing this.
That afternoon, I returned to the lab, hoping to get some of the work done that I’d hoped to go through in the morning.
