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Cole hissed when he saw the slice from the corrugated box. Okay, maybe it was worse than she thought. “Ouch,” he said, reaching for a tissue from his desk. He gingerly dabbed at the wound, clearing away the excess blood. “That’s a nasty one. It shouldn’t need stiches though. Let me get you some antibiotic cream.”
Joey grabbed the tissue he left and eyed him as he pulled out a drawer in his desk across the room. “You have a first-aid kit in your desk?” How many CEOs could say that?
He looked up from the small red case, triumphantly holding a small tube of ointment. “Of course.”
“Let me guess. Boy Scout?”
He walked back over and smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “No, I promise, I’m no Boy Scout. Just like to be prepared. In case I need to take care of someone,” he added, the velvety tenderness of his tone making her heart thunder in her ears.
He dabbed the ointment on her finger, his fingers impossibly gentle. She swallowed thickly, her own body betraying her.
“There.” He finished wrapping a Band-Aid around the cut. “Feel okay?”
She nodded wordlessly. His compassion was killing her.
Death by a thousand cardboard cuts would be preferable to falling for someone like him.
At least, that was what she had to keep telling herself.
* * *
Cole trudged back into the lobby of Zia around eight o’clock that night. His dinner meeting with the FDA representative had edged on disastrous. They’d been pushing him for a new update on the Cognitive Protective Barrier—Protein Gene Injection, or CPB-PGI—gene therapy project for months, and he’d been putting them off. Because it wasn’t ready to share. And until he could figure out how his research was being leaked, he couldn’t come out and request approval for the next stage. Moving forward while he had a data leak was asking for trouble.
The FDA representative confirmed that other labs were reporting first-round data from similar approaches. She’d also confirmed that their results hadn’t been good. Which didn’t make sense. Everything he’d seen from his own internal results had been extremely positive. At least when he’d last received an update. One of the things he was headed upstairs to do was put things in place for a more formal update.
Either way, without an update to the FDA in the next two months, the FDA was going to shut down the CPB-PGI therapy project based on the results seen elsewhere. Which would put an end to the most promising prevention therapy he’d seen in decades of research. The other results were a lie. They had to be. Giving up on this wasn’t an option. He just had to work harder.
He waved half-heartedly at the security guard at the front desk, then pulled his phone out of his pocket when it rang.
Flint’s name displayed on the readout, so despite his foul attitude, he answered.
“Any chance this can wait until tomorrow?”
“Wow, that’s quite a greeting. Do you answer everyone’s calls that way, or was that especially for me?” Flint’s good-natured ribbing brought a smile to Cole’s face.
“Hey, you should feel honored that I picked up at all. It’s been a day.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. Anything I can do?”
Cole punched the number for the twelfth floor and sighed. “Not really, man. As long as Joey does what she’s supposed to do.”
Flint hummed. “And how’s that going?”
Cole looked up at the ceiling. “She’s something else, Flint. I don’t know exactly what to make of her.”
On the other end of the phone, Flint chuckled. “Yeah, that sounds about right.”
“Why do you trust her so much?”
“We’ve been through the wringer together, you know? She means a lot to me. And I know she’s been through a lot. She won’t talk about it, but it makes it hard for her to trust people. But if you can get her on your side, you’ll never find a better ally.”
“And if she’s not on my side?”
Flint let out a low whistle. “Well then, watch out. But you shouldn’t have to worry about that.”
Cole wasn’t so sure. He remembered what she’d said in her office about her own reasons for not trusting him. What he couldn’t figure out was what it might be. Was it just her own issues or something about him in particular?
“She played a prank on me today,” he said plainly.
