"That's the spirit. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to get to my prior engagement." Brooke looks me up and down. Maybe it's wishful thinking, but I could swear her eyes soften for a microsecond. "Good night, Dustin."
"Good night, Ms. Dunne."
Oh no. Oh no. What have I done?
I pace back and forth in the company apartment, stammering to myself and shaking the tension from my hands. What have I done? I fucked Brooke—a coworker!—in the office. I fucked her on the conference table. Oh, my god, my career is over. The instant the security team reviews the nightly footage—
"Ohno," I gasp. My heart sinks to the floor, and I'm sure it lands somewhere in the NYC sewers. What if the building security was watching the whole time? What if they've already reported us—reportedme?I'm not her bossbut I am several levels above her in the org chart. This isdefinitelyagainst policies.
Bzzz bzzz bzzz.
I jump out of my skin as my phone rings—it has to be my boss, this is it, this is the call—and I can't look at the screen. Relying on muscle memory, I slide the bar to answer and bring the phone up to my ear with shaking hands.
"Hello?"
"Unka Dusty!" Nova, my niece, shrieks into the phone.
Begging my heart to calm down before I have an infarction, I smile and let out a sigh of relief. "Hi, pumpkin. You sound happy."
There's a rustling noise, and I hear Orion wrestle with his younger sister for control of the phone. "Uncle Dusty! Did you get the soup in ear?"
"I sure did, buddy," I lie through my teeth and wince. "You wanted a… big ol' pile of dog doo-doo, right?"
"Nooooo!" Orion cackles. "Gross!"
"Oh, right, right. You wanted Central Parkhorsedoo-doo."
"Yuuuuuuck!" Orion squeals into the phone. "Mama! Uncle Dusty is being weird!"
I hear my sister's muffled voice in the background as she expertly removes the phone from his undoubtedly sticky little hands. "Hey, Dustin."
"Hey, yourself. What are you doing letting these maniacs use your phone unattended?" I tease.
"Getting a moment's peace, though I can't say the same for you, huh?" Alicia chuckles. "How's the Big Apple?"
"It's… fine."
She hums thoughtfully. "One second. Hey, little goblins! I need you to find that wiffle ball if we're going to play after dinner, okay?"
A chorus of whines erupts on the other end of the call, but they quickly fade away. My sister lets out a sigh and I hear her thump up the carpeted stairs to her bedroom.
"Okay, what'sreallygoing on?" she asks.
Dammit. "Brooke is here."
She gasps. "Brooke? LikeBrookeBrooke? You're kidding—what's she doing there?"
"She works for DropTop," I groan and pinch the bridge of my nose. "I'm… overseeing the integration of their tech stack into Atmosphere. And she's an engineering manager."
"Wow, good for her," Alicia says. "Does that mean you have to, like, talk to her?"
"Yup," I huff out with a sigh. "Quite a bit, actually. She's very knowledgeable."
"Of course she is. She always was. But how are you feeling about all that?" Alicia gets straight to the point, as always. It used to drive our mother crazy. You could never get anything past my sister.
"Weird, but it's going to be fine. I'll do my job. She'll do hers. I'll leave after the four weeks is up, of course. Simple."
What I don't tell her is that this is anything but simple. It's complicated as fuck and getting worse by the minute. Even though Brooke said we'd never do… that… again. I believe her, too—never again. Just a one-time thing. A one-time thing that my dick won't let me stop thinking about.
