Chapter 2
2
True to her word—and Mr. Goulding’s explicit instructions—Carly gives me the rest of the week to get adjusted. I spend my time wisely, filling my new bookshelves with reference manuals and myriad textbooks. I want to show my new coworkers that I have the academic background to understand their work and am not simply a glorified programmer. If I don’t have a deep appreciation for what I’m coding, how can I ever possibly be trusted to write AI programs to further their research and cut their paperwork time in half?
More importantly, I’ll need to model empathetic knowledge to assure them that my robust AI programs aren’t intended to replace their very human brains.
Even academics have an understandable amount of distrust in the new, sweeping field of Artificial Intelligence. Though it’s been around since the 1950s, it never quite got off the ground. What very few people understand is that AI needs humans to teach it how to behave. We’re not trying to replace human researchers. We’re just trying to make that research happen faster, more efficiently, with less errors, and better outcomes.
Instead of another fifty years until a viable artificial heart is available commercially, AI-grounded research can help scientists produce a model in a much shorter time span. One that won’t be rejected by the body or only last for a few days in a bovine host.
I suspect I’ve inadvertently met several of my R the quality of their equipment, coaching, or training. It’s not their inherent natural ability, or how hard they’re willing to work.
It’s certainly not their fucking diagnosed IQ scores.
No.
What really separates successes from failures is the dividing line between who gives up first.
I almost gave up.
No. More.
At the very least…not today, Satan.
If there’s one painful lesson that I’ve learned repeatedly and learned well, it’s that failures teach far more than successes ever will .
I will never be ignorant again. I will never hide behind the veil of the adage that ignorance is bliss.
I’m not going to get hurt this time. I’ll make damn sure of that.
In the interests of achieving my singular goal, I approach the table with a steaming mug of liquid alertness in one hand and an extended, open palm offered with the other. “I’m Dr. Elise Fowler. We haven’t been formally introduced yet, but it’s a pleasure to meet you.”
They continue to stare at me—and my promised handshake—as if I’m a venomous snake in the grass.
“Did you know that people often use the word poisonous instead of venomous to describe animals that might kill them?” I blurt out. “It’s not true. Poison is something we voluntarily, if not accidentally, ingest by a variety of means. The rhododendron family of flowering bushes is an excellent example. That genus of plants is a known neurotoxin, but most people don’t generally chew on azalea flowers. Venom is something we’re subjected to by an outside source, such as a bite from a brown recluse spider.”
One of the men coughs an uncomfortable sounding laugh before offering his hand for me to shake. “Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Dr. Fowler. Thanks for the info.”
“Joel!” a not-so-strange male voice barks from the doorway of the break room. “Release her immediately.”
My heart thunders at an unhealthy rate in my ears. I’m forced to grip the edge of the table to remain standing. Because my knees threaten to buckle from overwhelming negative emotions that I absolutely do not want to be feeling right now.
I won’t be stupid. Not again. I refuse to feel. I must think .
I already know what I’m going to see before the barking man-dog ever walks into my line of sight. I am wholly unprepared for the sight anyway .
I also now understand why Carly said some of these nerds are hot with muscles for days.
Because Peter Carrington is hot. Unfairly, he’s even hotter than the last time I saw him in person. Dressed in a suit and tie instead of khakis and a t-shirt, his ebony hair effortlessly styled, a dark five o’clock shadow that enhances the line of his jaw—he’s the epitome of all grown up. Doesn’t matter that it’s only been a year since I last laid eyes on him. From the looks of him, it might as well have been a lifetime. At least, it certainly feels that way.
I shake off that unwelcome thought.
No. No feeling. Only scientific method data collection.
That is all I will allow.
I catalogue his appearance the way a scientist would make note of a specimen beneath a microscope for study.
Men who require glasses to correct their imperfect vision are not supposed to be this sexy. I hypothesize that his muscles supersede the glasses that frame his hazel eyes. Even beneath the fine fabric of his suit, it’s obvious upon visual observation that his old muscles have gained new muscles. He doesn’t possess muscles for days. He possesses muscles on top of muscles in a way that shouldn’t be biologically possible. Even his musculature is unaverage.
It pisses me off that these superfluous muscles enhance his slightly unaverage appearance. At first glance, he shouldn’t be so attractive. There’s something jagged about the harsh angles of his face. Something that isn’t quite underwear model worthy. It’s the closer inspection and the tone of his voice and his domineering presence that elevates him to otherworldly status.
Damn him for existing. Damn him for being here. Damn him for defying the laws of nature.
This was supposed to be my fresh start .
“Noooooooooooooo.” The word drags out of me like a funeral dirge.
I am not adept at social skills. Therefore, I am also not adept at hiding my emotions when emotions are the last thing I should be showing to my sworn enemy.
Of all the possible bosses I could have imagined that my coworkers were talking about, I never would have guessed it was him .
Joel’s gaze swings between me and Peter. He clears his throat. “Dr. Elise Fowler, allow me to introduce you to the head of Chester R&D since you haven’t met him yet. You’ll report directly to Dr. Pete Carrington.”
“Nooooooooooo.” My body involuntarily vomits again. Figuratively. Not literally. Blessedly, on a whisper this time.
Peter’s mouth pulls into a frown before he directs his attention to the man who forcibly extricates his hand from my grasp. “What have we talked about? Repeat it back to me.”
Joel hangs his head, but a tell-tale smirk lifts the side of his mouth.
“Not everyone likes to be touched,” he says like he’s reading a manual. “Sorry. I forgot. I was just so excited to finally meet her.”
One of the other men’s eyes narrow at us, assessing this most unfortunate situation. He says, “Pete? Problem?”
“Not a problem,” he assures as his studious gaze rakes over me. He does not have to imagine what I look like beneath my potentially inappropriate wardrobe choice, unlike the leering coworkers Carly previously introduced me to. “She’s just shocked. She didn’t expect me here.”
Understatement of the millenium! A century isn’t long enough to define my level of shock.
“Do you two know each other?” Joel asks again .
Peter nods as Joel’s gaze volleys between everyone else around the table. “We were in grad school together.”
Another involuntary sound escapes my horrifically shocked body. Something between a snarl and a scoff at his understatement. Like we were just two chummy fellow grad students, slaving away in desperation to be awarded those three little letters, commiserating over bully advisors by sharing cheap beers at the local bar.
I’m not sure whether to be grateful that he hasn’t implied the full truth of the matter—unlike Mr. Goulding—or if I should punch him in the testicles for his withholding.
Joel beams at learning this not entirely accurate information. “Awesome! Then you won’t need an adjustment period to learn how to deal with this exacting asshole!”
“Joel,” Peter hisses. “Language.”
I continue my staredown of the millennium with the enemy. He stares back, cataloguing all the similar changes in me in the past year, no doubt. In my impossibly unproblematic high-cut blouse, black pencil skirt, and 3-inch heels, I hope he sees that I’m dressed for success. No more ratty hair, comfortable leggings, and bulky t-shirts. No, sir. I’m here to conduct business. Everything else about me is closed for business.
Joel laughs. “Pete, come on. This is the R&D department. We don’t want to lie to Elise right out of the gate. All we do is curse.”
“Language,” Peter repeats. “In this building, you will address me as Dr. Carrington, not Pete. And her name is Dr. Fowler—not sweetie, honey, or any other misogynistic endearment you can think of.”
Joel rolls his eyes. “Sure thing.” He focuses his grin at me. “I’m Joel Adams, materials engineering extraordinaire. These assholes…”
He goes through introductions for all the men seated around the table, but his words don’t sink into my utterly paralyzed brain. I am incapable of accepting new information because I’m completely focused on the poisonous, venomous, utterly toxic-to-me man standing mere feet away from me.
He wasn’t supposed to be here. I was never supposed to see him again.
Our coworkers’ gazes slide toward Peter, who slowly extends his open palm toward me.
The world is truly so, so, so unfair.
“It’s good to see you again, Dr. Fowler,” he murmurs with a carefully neutral tone of voice.
I glance at his hand, suspended in air, awaiting my reciprocal display of appropriate social behavior during an introduction.
He is—utterly unfairly—my superior. I cannot refuse his handshake.
The moment his warm, dry skin envelops mine, my eyes close on reflex.
Though I have consciously tried to forget, my body remembers the feel of his hands on me. I forcibly erase the lightning-fast images that pop up in my mind like a blooper reel of my stupidity.
“Why couldn’t you have turned into a bald, wart-covered troll?” I whisper.
Not that humans become trolls outside the realm of fiction, but still. It’s the least he deserves after what he did to me.
I abruptly open my eyes, all too aware that I’ve left myself open to another unsuspecting attack from him.
Peter frowns. Even his frowns are illogically attractive. He pulls his hand away, then he pivots and stalks out of the room.
Joel stares at me with wide eyes. “What kind of voodoo magic was that?”
I furrow my brow at his question that is clearly addressed to me. “I don’t understand what you mean.”
“That.” Joel points to where Peter disappeared down the hallway. “If any insubordinate in this department talked to him that way, he’d have torn them a new asshole.”
I lick my lips, the magnitude of this horrid situation settling into the pit of my curdled stomach. “I…I didn’t mean it. That was supposed to be an inside thought.” I’ve managed to blurt out the first horrid thing that pops into my overwhelmed brain. “I was distracted by all his muscles.”
My excuse doesn’t even make any logical sense. I wished for him to be a wart-covered troll. Out loud!
Carly sighs, the sound a curious mix between awestruck and concerned. I wasn’t even aware that she’d walked into the break room. “Is there a problem?”
I sigh, resigning myself to my fate.
“No,” I lie. “No problem at all.”