AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Her words hung in the ensuing silence. Darcy wanted to crawl out of her skin–and this damn coat that was starting to feel like a cocoon.
“Miss Taylor,” Nazyn said at last.
“Darcy, please.”
“Very well.Darcy, this might be something I’ll need to apologize for after you answer me, but I’m confused,” he went on. “How in the Nines could you have known?”
“Well, Walter was scandalized after I did it. I figured it was common knowledge?”
“No. Deruzians don’t make a habit out of revealing our secrets,” he said gravely. “And I understand humans have different expectations from a social interaction.Wecame toyourplanet.”
Darcy breathed a sigh of relief. At least they got that sorted. “Since I’m already oversharing, I just wanted to say I really admire your work. I haven’t been through the portal myself or anywhere near it, but I hear it’s spectacular.”
Darcy had heard it described as a mix between a purple vortex and a lava circle and she wanted to see it with her own eyes so badly. And here she was, sitting next to the guy who’d opened it. By himself.
The universe was funny that way.
“Thank you.” He inclined his head, all polite and calm, as if he’d heard it a million times before. He probably had. “I hope you’ll be as impressed with the device we’re presenting in two days.”
Darcy hesitated. Could she?Shouldshe? But her parents, who were so very proud of her being the first college graduate in the family, had always taught her to speak her mind. “I don’t even know what device we’re presenting, Walter didn’t mention anything.”
“Walter doesn’t know either.”
Darcy’s brows rose until they disappeared underneath her bangs. “So itissome super secret project.”
“It’s…complicated,” was all he said, and even that sounded pained.
Well, see, Darcy didn’t love this. Knowledge was power, and she couldn’t do her job without it, now could she? She’d been kept in the dark at work before. “Is that the official answer I’m going to use at the event when people ask me details or…?”
Nazyn’s eyes widened. “That’s…”
“Complicated?”
“Surprising,” he said with a laugh. “It’s been a while since someone has questioned what I said.”
Darcy licked her lips. “I didn’t mean it like that, I–”
“No, it’s good,” he said, a hint of a smile playing on his gorgeous lips, some of his detached calm vanishing. If Darcy wasn’t mistaken–which she might’ve been, she was nervous and excited all at once–he was warming up. “Inventors need to be challenged. I’ve missed this.”
A few more seconds of silence passed. Darcy could almost feel the cogs turning in that brilliant mind of his. Finally, he tilted his chin in what looked like a Deruzian nod, mind made up.
“I’m going to tell you everything you need to know–”
Not everythingeverything–just the necessary details. Darcy could live with that. It wasn’t like Nazyn knew her. She could be a corporate spy, after all–those things happened in the industry way more often than anyone wanted to admit.
“–but you can’t tell anyone until the final reveal,” he said. “As the humans say,do we have a deal?”
Darcy gulped. Shit. “Deal.”
6
NAZYN
Nazyn should have learned from his traitorous ancestors that striking deals wasn’t a glorious idea.
Darcy had to know about the holograms, that was a fact. And facts were uncontestable. But if Nazyn told her about them, then he had to admit that the technology didn’t work perfectly on Earth, which Nazyn hated. But he especially hated admitting it to Darcy.
Why?
