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Nine
“It’s a good thing Royce and Taylor aren’t here,” Brannon said from the head of the conference room table.
“Agreed,” Jayson said. Those two deserved to enjoy their honeymoon and their time together without worrying about problems at the office.
“We’ll solve the issue before they come home,” Gia chimed in from his left. Her eyes flashed quickly from Jayson to Brannon.
As Jayson had expected, she’d been as cool as a cliché cucumber this week. He’d seen her react that way before—after the car sex and the almost-sex last year. She’d let herself go with him, but when they were done, she acted like it’d never happened.
That morning after Royce and Taylor’s wedding, Jayson exited the bathroom first with Gia behind him. Addison had given them a wide-eyed blink followed by a sideways smirk. There was no need to explain. He guessed Addison Abrams had overheard enough to answer any lingering questions she might’ve had.
Natasha, on the other hand, hadn’t noticed he was missing. He’d driven her home, admittedly awkward after their tense date, but she hadn’t said much. Though she did make sure and tell him, “It was a nice wedding, but we will not be seeing each other again, Coop.”
Fine by him.
He’d called Mason after the drop-off to apologize for potentially ruining his stepbrother’s working relationship with Natasha, but Mason assured Jay that his prize supermodel was under contract.
That left Jayson to wonder what the hell he’d been thinking bringing a stranger to a Knox wedding. And further wondering why the hell Gia had done the same thing. But he knew. They’d been trying to fireproof from exactly what had ended up happening anyway.
Jayson couldn’t regret it, even if Gia was still giving him the cold shoulder. He, for one, wanted to do it again. No sense in letting perfectly incredible sex rot on the vine.
He wasn’t sure where she stood. If she was regretful or reliving the afternoon on a loop in her head the way he was. She was a good actor when she needed to be. And at ThomKnox, under the watching eyes of her brothers, she did some of her best work. He understood why she didn’t want to broadcast what happened, but he saw no need in pretending. Addison knew what had happened, so there was a ninety-nine-point-nine percent chance that Brannon knew, too.
He glanced at his ex-wife while her brother pecked at the T13 tablet in his hand. She held Jayson’s gaze for an extra beat, licking her top lip before pressing it against her bottom one.
He’d expected an unreadable expression, but hers wasn’t unreadable. Her eyes were heated and slightly vulnerable, and the way she jerked her gaze from his gave her away.
She wanted him again. He knew it in his balls. Not such a good actor after all, it seemed.
“I see what you mean.” Brannon frowned at the tablet in his hands. “It shuts down.”
“That’s the bug,” Jayson said, his mind returning to the task at hand. The tablet launch last year had been smooth and since then, the sales were above where they’d projected. The software update that was due to go out next month, however, was a hot wad of WTF. “It ran fine last week and now it’s not. I have no idea what’s transpired since then to screw it up.”
Unless Jayson and Gia having sex caused a tear in space and the working part of the software was sucked into a black hole.
Unlikely.
“We’ll find the glitch,” she reassured all of them, her expression shifting back to calm and collected. “We have the best tech team is the country.”
“Damn straight,” Jayson agreed. He didn’t realize that he and Gia were smiling at each other until Brannon cleared his throat.
“No need to mention this to Taylor or Royce until they’re back to work. This issue could go away in a matter of hours.” Bran handed the tablet back to Jayson.
Also unlikely. Jayson had complete faith in their tech team, himself included, but he wasn’t sure this problem would be resolved that quickly.
“I’ll clear my desk and make myself available,” Gia said. “You could use the extra brainpower.” She smirked at her brother and Jayson and then left the conference room.
“You two seem to be getting along well,” Brannon said, his tone droll.
“Yeah.” Jayson wasn’t giving him any more than that, just in case.
“Guess her and Pip didn’t work out.”
“Guess not.” Jayson smiled.
“How’s it going with Natasha?”
“That didn’t work out, either. Which I’m assuming you already know.”
