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“I’m Korean, asshole,” I snapped, my temper surging to the surface. “And those hires are five-thousand times the programmers and developers that you are. July heads up her own department—” I cut myself off. “Whatever. Forget it. And for the final time, Zakary, I am not interested. I have never beeninterested.” The elevator was one floor away. “And a little tip—don’t call women ‘bitches.’”
“I didn’t,” he said, outraged. “You called me an asshole.”
I pointed at the corner of the elevator. “You grabbed me without my consent. I could get you fired in a second for that. But if you leave me—and my friends alone—I won’t. Just fuck off already.” I glared at him. “Take a hint. None of us want to be around you.”
When the elevator doors opened, I stormed off, and went straight to the cozy office in the corner that I shared with Taisha and Morgan. They weren’t back yet and I sat there, staring out across the city, and wishing I could wash the ick of that ride off my skin.
Needing a distraction, I pulled out my laptop, brushed at my cheeks—pretending that I didn’t notice the dampness, and started to hunt down potential spots that the Michaelson family might own.
“Hey, what are you doing?” Taisha asked and I looked up. “Woah, focused face.”
I smiled at her as she held out the paper bag with my breakfast sandwich. “I just got us intoSerafino’s,” I said and her jaw dropped. “Yeah, you’re welcome.”
“Holy shit,” she squealed. “That’s like the most exclusive club in the Seaport. We didn’t even think you wanted to come out.”
I flashed her a real grin. “I wanted to make up for missing our coffee run.”
Taisha laughed and shook her curls. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear you had some nefarious ulterior motive for getting us into Serafino’s. But I don’t care. I can’t wait to tell July and Morgan.”
She darted off and I smirked down at my computer screen, imagining Mr. Hype sweating over havingHyperiondown for nearly three days.
Maybe I do have a slight ulterior motive—but only because I’m a fucking genius.
Tonight, I would find a Michaelson gangster to sweettalk—and then I’d take down the whole goddamn criminal organization.
Hold on, Lia,I thought, gazing out across the city awash in morning light, and the distant harbor.I’m gonna find you and bring you home—soon.
Zakary
Standing on the other side of the “Girls’ Club,”as I called the corner office with the best fucking views of the financial district, looking east to the harbor, and shit, I pulled upSerafino’son my phone. Red washed through my vision and I clenched myfist, resisting the urge to punch through the wall behind me. I couldn’t let those stupid women figure out that the wall let everyone hear everything that they were saying.
I smirked. Not my fault they thought themselves so untouchable. Just like when I’d overheard Ana’s little confession to her boyfriend about missing a period. Disgusting slut, talking about that shit on company time. HR didn’t have to know what that sexually explicit conversation entailed. I only hoped that she had been deported back to China by now.
Whatever, I didn’t want to think about that. What I needed to figure out was why Sara could go out dancing with co-workers, but not to dinner? What was this bitch’s problem? Why couldn’t she see a good thing right in front of her face?
How much nicer did I have to be to get her to fucking listen?
Chewing on my nails, I stalked back to my cubicle, under the burnt-out light, and threw myself into my seat. After clicking around emails that weren’t important, I opened Iris-Beta, and shook my head. However, before I went to exit, I noted that a new update did offer an interesting possibility for mobile hacking. An idea went off in my brain and I smirked to myself, then settled in to dig into the employee directory ofMoxi,and almost missed the alert on my phone for the all-staff.
Grumbling to myself, I got a return result a moment later, and grinned. Sara’s cell phone number, which she so assiduously tried to avoid letting me have. Too bad—and after all, hadn’t she been the one to tell me to try out Iris-Beta? My heart pumped alittle faster and I wondered if perhaps it had been a dare, a way to get me to prove that I deserved her number.
That shit was annoying, but I’d won.
I strutted into the All-Staff, immediately glancing toward Sara and her Girls’ Club, all of whom were chatting and smiling, and ignoring me. A bolt of irritation coursed through me, and I threw myself into a seat, popping open my laptop and typing loudly, glancing over to see if Sara was looking when I wasn’t.
I didn’t catch her, but I did manage to start dismantling the weird ass protections on her phone.Paranoid, egotistical bitchmuttered the voice in the back of my head.
See, this was why she needed me around. She was too full of herself, glutted on ego and hanging around the wrong people. She needed me to remind her of where women belonged in the world—and she’d be happier for it. And she wouldn’t need all this protection on her phone.
At one point, trying to get through the last layer, I accidentally caused her phone to blare an alarm, and everyone jumped. The CEO shot an angry look at her, while Sara pulled out her phone, a baffled expression on her reasonably pretty face, and then went red. Her mouth turned down, her eyes were downcast, and she voiced a squeaky apology. I grinned to myself, reveling in her abasement and apologetic expression—soon, she’d been saying as much to me.
I went to dismantle another layer of her protection when suddenly, I was kicked out of her phone, and I started. My computer went haywire, windows opening and closing, then the entire thing powered off.FuckI screamed in my head, and I barely kept myself from roaring it.
Glancing over at Sara, I saw that she had a demure look on her face, focused on the speaker, now the CIO, and rage kindled in my chest. This would take hours, maybe days to repair. I didn’t know how, but Sara had done that. Somehow. Little fucking code witch who didn’t know what she was doing.
It didn’t matter how nice her long black hair was or her dainty chin, she was not hot enough to be such a bitch.
And tonight, I’d teach her that.
