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Ruben was quick to follow her gaze. ‘That your boss?’ he probed.
Harlow quickly averted her eyes and chose silence.
‘That’s Kage Sable, CEO of this joint,’ Ruben said in a pseudo whisper. ‘Even if he’s not your direct report, he’s the ultimate linchpin of this place. Heard he and the other members of The Sable Group are meta and have some powerful tech integrated into their biology.’
‘Wow, sounds like some wild speculation,’ Harlow muttered. ‘In any case, it’s way above my pay grade.’
Harlow moved forward in the line, biting her lip as she kept her irritation to herself.
‘Interesting guy,’ Ruben prattled on. ‘Did the induction for our team this morning. A bit of a hard ass on security, though. From what I heard from others, there’s some big project under wraps here. Got any in on it?’
She simply smiled at him and was saved by the buffet. She reached out for a serving spoon and kept Ruben at bay with inane comments about the food.
He was undoubtedly pushy,Harlow thought as she filled her plate. She sensed a restless energy under the carefully constructed veneer of his movie star looks and wondered what lay underneath his skin. She didn’t mind him, but she cared about Kage watching her talking to him. Why, though, she couldn’t quite nail.
Before Ruben could continue, Harlow spotted one of the women who’d been on her shuttle ride earlier seated at a nearby table and made a beeline for her.
‘Hi, weren’t we on the same hop this morning?’ she said with a wide, friendly smile.
To her relief, the woman looked up and responded with a welcoming grin.
‘Hey, I remember you. I’m Sondra, a components designer. These are a few members of my team,’ she said, waving her hand at the group gathered at the table. ‘Want to join us?’
She scooted to the side of the bench and let Harlow squeeze in. Ruben, who’d trailed closely behind her, was forced to walk off to an emptier table nearby.
Harlow gave him a smile and waggled her fingers as he stalked past, noting the tight look on his face that he legit tried to hide.She’d need to keep an eye on him,she thought. Then she turned away, concentrating on the excellent parmesan pasta bake and tossed salad on her plate and on making new friends.
Later when she dared to look up, Kage was nowhere to be seen. Yet she still felt the searing heat of his gaze as if he were still in the room. She swivelled her head, looking around, but he was gone. But his presence lingered.
She didn’t have time to unpack his apparent interest in her conversation with Ruben, so she pushed him out of her head and returned to her new office space to dive back into her planning. Her work day from then on flew with zero interruptions.
Then at 1600 hours, the man she’d kicked out of her head strolled right back and into her lab, trailed by three people.
She looked up from her screen, blinking owlishly at them.
‘Apologies Harlow for the interruption,’ Kage drawled, not looking in the least remorseful. ‘I’d mentioned earlier that I wanted to introduce you to your team.’
‘Yes, of course,’ she said, rising from her desk. Harlow gave a happy smile as she recognised Sondra from earlier.
‘Sondra Atelo, your components designer. Bassam Lin, your propulsion expert and Dan Linden, our ship engineer extraordinaire. Everyone, this is Harlow Meridien. The highly respected and visionary propulsion fuel scientist from Dunia who’s leading this project.’
They all shook hands and fell into conversation while Harlow quickly studied her new team. Sondra was dark-skinned, almost ebony. A beauty so rare these days and only found chiefly in very expensive donor births.She must have well-heeled parents,Harlow thought. She seemed friendly, however, and Harlow was super pleased to be working with her, especially after the camaraderie they’d shared over lunch. Bassam was slight, bespectacled and shy. He was also Falasian which was rare in the science world given their government’s obscure purge of all scientific knowledge over twenty years ago. Dan was a local Edenite, born and bred on the rock, evidenced by his accent and fashionable attire. He seemed friendly, too, and Harlow felt at ease instantly with him. She smiled her pleasure.
Kage met her gaze across the room and gave her a warm look and a raised eyebrow as if asking for her approval.
Her heart jumped. She’d need to find a way of being in the same vicinity as him without reacting. Instead, she gave him the nod he was looking for, then broke their heated gaze.
Kage cleared his throat, cutting short the exciting conversation and introductions. ‘Team.’
They all turned to face him.
‘Find a seat. Let’s get comfortable.’
They all gathered around the central work table and pulled a seat each.
‘Let’s quickly discuss the project,’ Kage continued once they settled. ‘First things first. Welcome to the Skylab Proto-XE team. We specially selected you three for your outstanding work and skillsets for this project. Thank you for joining us. Your new boss is Harlow - and she’s been developing the first hyper FTL drives powered by refined xentium mixed with elentium. Harlow, could you please elaborate further?’
She shot him a quick smile before pulling a screen to the centre of the table and turning it on. Then, she took them through a brief presentation using her comm tab.
