I couldn’t tell Lucas that Temple was the one I babysat. Lucas needed to feel safe with him. Because he was. When it came to Temple, it was me who might get burned.
10.Watercooler Gossip and Office Romances
Chase
This ‘Lucas Milton this is your life’ tour better not screw us over. Lucas explained nobody would think to look for him here. He was on sabbatical and hadn’t been at work for months.
I still didn’t like this. Temple better be right about his mysterious hunch.
Lucas wavered between excitement and dread as we walked up to the office building. "So… here it is.”
He stared down firmly at the sidewalk, avoiding the disappointment he so clearly expected on my face. The place was about as far away from a secret agent as possible.
"Do you operate out of a secret sublevel under the main building?" I quipped.
"Nope. I’m not really a secret agent." His smile looked strained. “I work for the IRS.”
Yep, the no-nonsense sign out front indicated as much while we stood outside of a boring grey building.
“Neat?” Temple offered when the silence stretched on.
Nice going. I elbowed him and he elbowed me back with a smart look.I don’t see you coming up with anything better.
Yeah, we were off to afantasticstart.
Lucas led the way as we entered the building.
A phone call to the place would accomplish this quickly, but we needed more than just his dad’s whereabouts. We needed the man himself to trust us… to trustme.Lucas had obviously been struggling since his accident. Struggling alone. We needed Lucas to open up to find out more.
The offices inside looked even more bland than the outside. Rows and rows of cubicles and serious faces, hands clacking away at keyboards. Did I imagine it or was everything tinted grey, like colors faded and died slowly here?
“Don’t start.” Lucas directed at me. “Don’t ask if this is all part of an elaborate cover. I’m not a spy.”
"007, you’re back!"
A woman emerged from the cubicle jungle and approached quickly, wrapping Lucas in a huge hug. Human, she smelled of vanilla lotion and coffee. The coworker clearly knew him well… how well did they know each other?
I pasted on a grin when they parted. “Do you tell everyone you’re a secret agent, Mr. Milton?”
“Oh, don’t judge him.” She waved a hand, then offered it to me to shake. “I’m Ashley Winters. We government drones gotta get our thrills where we can.”
"Hey, Chase Slate. If you twowereagents, you’re not being very discrete by broadcasting it so much."
“Unless we’re hiding in plain sight.” She winked. Hey, that was my thing!
“God, it’s a joke…” Lucas flushed bright red, all too aware he explained this inside joke to actual secret agents. Well, detectives from the hidden supernatural world, which by default made us secret. “Um, Jack started making James Bond jokes, or actually, I’m pretty sure they wereovert insults,but Ashley thought it was more fun to say we were secret agents instead of the truth which is—" he gestured to the cubicles “—so it’s our inside joke now.”
“Mhmm.” Ashley nodded. “We took it back from Jack, it’s our thing now.”
"Even if he still thinks it’s an insult at my expense?"
"Whatever, we totally took it back from him." She nudged him with an elbow, a teasing smile on her face. Then she realized company was here. “Who are these guys?”
"Oh god, I can’t go through this again," muttered Lucas instead of answering her. “Ashley, did my dad stop by?”
“No, I haven’t seen—hold on.” She dashed away and came back a few moments later. “No, he apparently talked to Shelia in reception over the phone, just confirmed you weren’t here and said goodbye. Were you supposed to come in today? Are you coming back to work?”
“Uh…” Lucas stepped back, not sure where to start and suddenly overwhelmed.
