Page 70 of My Secret Snowflake
Sebastian tilts his head back and swallows. And oh, his Adam’s apple.
This closet is way, way too small. And we’re way too close. And I’m afraid to move and make a noise.
Our glances meet again, and he takes a deep breath. I can smell the peppermint of his toothpaste. His gaze travels over my face, and it’s almost as if he’s touching me with it. My whole body is flickering, my senses are buzzing.Mustsquash down these feelings of desire.
“Great. That’s all settled,” Jazmine says.
There’s a slight tap as if they’ve picked up their laptops. And then the door creaks as it opens and clicks shut.
“We’ve got to go before someone else comes.” I reach to open the door.
“I can’t leave yet,” Sebastian says, his voice low and tight. “You go.”
Sebastian is attracted to me.
Or he is just a guy in a tight space with a woman.
I open the door just a bit and slip through the space, closing the door behind me.
And out steps Xavier from the opposite door—the door that leads into his office.
“Eavesdropping?” he asks.
Chapter seventeen
Sebastian
ThesoundofXavier’svoice quickly cools any desire. I step out. Iris looks shell-shocked.
How much did he hear?Do we proceed with our cover story? Does Iris want me to say that?
“I heard you guys when you entered. I was waiting for Colby and Kevin,” Xavier says.
No cover story.
“Why are you eavesdropping?” he asks.
“Because we think Kevin hired a hacker to obtain New Mexico’s board presentation so he could give it to Colby—and maybe you—so you’d have an inside knowledge on how to make the New York presentation better,” Iris says.
Xavier nods. “I wasn’t in on it, but I definitely suspected something when our presentation changed so much. It was so much better than New Mexico’s in ways it wouldn’t have been without those last-minute changes.”
“That also raised my suspicions. The changes were just so on point,” I say.
“I also know my brother. He always cheated at Monopoly. But even so, I didn’t expect this. And I don’t expect you to believe me when I tell you I wasn’t involved. But I’ll prove it by my follow-up actions. My brother and Kevin will have to go. I will tell the Board.” He slumps down into a chair. “I wish he’d trusted me. L’Etoile is not going to shut us down—our ideas are just too good—but now I don’t know.”
He looks at me. “Why are you involved?” And then he turns to Iris. “Did you think to involve Legal? You two aren’t really dating?”
“No,” Iris says quickly. Way too quickly.
“Iris and I are friends, and Legal was informed of the unauthorized hacker. And then I looked through our files and found a partially executed hacker agreement.” We explain the rest of what we found.
“Thank you for your hard work and your honesty,” Xavier says. “I’ll schedule a meeting with the board. You can tell them what you’ve told me. Do you think Bob is involved?”
“Not that I’m aware of,” I say.
“I’ll talk to him, then,” Xavier says. “We’ll figure out if there’s any way to save the company while admitting to this.”
The door to the conference room opens, and Colby enters. I take a step back.
