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“Yeah. Look, did something happen tonight, Mr. Calderone? Your shirt-”
He cuts me off. “Go home. Tell her you simply forgot the time.”
Another car drives in, headlights catching us in their light. Adrian stiffens beside me but relaxes almost at once.
He nods to the man in the approaching car. “Go,” he adds as the car comes to a halt a few spaces away.
I walk past the parking car. Inside a man in his thirties is climbing out, ignoring me, heading straight over to Adrian to shake his hand.
“Boss,” the man says. “Where is he? Should I-”
“Not here,” Adrian replies, glancing my way as I look back at the two of them. “We’ll talk inside.”
The man disappears through the door, but Adrian remains where he is, his eyes fixed on me until I’m driving out of the lot.
* * *
I find Lily in the kitchen, pile of coding books piled up in front of her, laptop open next to them. “You nearly dropped me right in it,” I say as I start making a cocoa.
“Me? What did I do?”
“Sent that text while he was looking at my phone. I think he saw it.”
“Whoops. Sorry.”
“So now he knows I’m a virgin, and I’ve got a crush on him, so thanks for that.”
She closes the laptop and stretches her arms above her head. “If he saw the message does that mean he was actually in your office?” She lets out a yawn. “What was he even doing there at this time of night?”
“He had blood on his shirt.”
“What?”
“Said it wasn’t his blood. Told me to go home and forget about it.”
“Holy shit, are you serious?”
“It gets better. He escorted me out to my car. Then, as I was leaving, this other guy showed up, and the two of them went inside together.”
“Wow. I mean seriously, wow. What do you think it means? Gay lovers?”
“I very much hope not.”
“You could call the cops. I mean, maybe he hurt someone.”
“And tell them what? Adrian will have changed his shirt by now and it’s my word against his. I rock the boat and he fires me just as the project’s ready to go live. I’ve spent a year working on this, Lil. Get it right and we revolutionize logistics with an AI that kicks business ass.”
“I love it when you talk dirty,” she replies, giving me a wink.
“The point is I’ve worked fucking hard on this project and I’m not falling at the last hurdle.”
“So you’re just going to forget he turned up covered in blood at midnight with some stranger?”
“No, I’m not going to forget that. But I am going to drink this cocoa and then go to bed. I need to get back in early tomorrow if I’m going to get those bugs sorted in time.”
“You could use this as leverage, you know?” She scoops the books up into her arms, heading out of the kitchen with them.
“Hint that he better give you a huge bonus, and if he doesn’t, tell him you’ll blab about what you saw tonight.”
