CHAPTER 1 AN AUDIBLE DISTRACTION
HUNTER
There are two kinds of first weeks at a new job.
One where you wander around in a daze, wondering if you’ve fooled everyone during the interview process into thinking you’re a competent individual worthy of a salary and benefits. Where you spend most of those first days pretending to look busy while internally screaming.
And then there’s this.
“This magnitude of budget variance doesn’t just happen, Franklin,” says the Minotaur from the head of the table. His nostrils flare and I can almost hear a collective gulp from the room. “It’s either accounted for… or it’s negligence.”
I’m ninety percent sure he could crush a car with one hand.
Okay. Ninety-five percent sure.
This is my fourth day at Labyrinth Solutions, and I am currently sitting in a glass-walled conference room that feels less like a meeting and more like a tribunal.
Flanked by chairs that clearly cost a fortune, the long table stretches with employees.
Thanks to being in a constant state of overwhelm I’ve mostly kept under wraps, I’ve reviewed employee profiles on the corporate intranet almost incessantly, so I at least recognize most of them.
We all ignore the view of the city that’s too lovely for the tension currently simmering.
I keep my expression neutral. Attentive. Employed.
“Right, of course,” says Franklin, who looks like he hasn’t slept in a decade and is now rapidly approaching a full-body stress response. He shuffles a stack of papers that absolutely no one is looking at and frost emanates from his hands. “It’s just—there were some… unexpected adjustments—”
“There are always adjustments,” the car-crushing CEO replies calmly.
Magnus.
That’s his name. I learned it on day one when Jamie Torress, an apparently brilliant strategist and somehow both the most put-together and most chaotic person I’ve ever met whispered, That’s Magnus, don’t panic, which of course made me immediately panic.
Magnus steeples his fingers. The room goes quieter, which I didn’t think was possible.
“This meeting,” he says, “is to ensure that adjustments are anticipated and planned for. Not explained after the fact.”
Franklin nods like a bobblehead on the verge of detachment.
To Magnus’s right, Jamie is typing something on his laptop with the focused intensity of someone absolutely not taking notes on the meeting. He catches me looking and gives me a quick, conspiratorial half-smile before glancing back at his screen.
I like Jamie. Jamie feels like survival. I can relate.
On the far end of the table, Greg, the massive but incredibly sweet IT guy, is crouched by the wall, engaged in a losing battle with the projector. There are four cables involved, possibly five, and at least one of them is definitely not helping.
“Did you try switching the input?” Jamie calls without looking up.
“I have switched every input,” Greg mutters through a tusky forced smile. “I’m running out of inputs.”
“Have you tried believing in yourself?” Jamie offers.
I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from smiling. It’s my first week. Keep it professional, Hunter.
The projector flickers. Dies. Flickers again.
“Do we absolutely need this presentation?” Magnus asks, not looking at Greg.
“Yes,” Franklin says immediately.
“No,” Jamie says at the same time.
Magnus turns his head, very slowly, toward Jamie.
Jamie pauses. “Emotionally? No. Structurally? Debatable.”
“Let’s aim for structurally necessary,” Magnus says.
Greg makes a noise that might be a laugh or might be despair. Either way, he’s completely adorable. In that, black-glasses, chest busting out of his button-down way.
The door opens behind me.
It’s quiet. Subtle. The kind of thing I would normally ignore amid this projector chaos.
Except my ears perk up—
plink.
clang.
…rattle.
The sound carries across the room, soft but unmistakable. Not loud, not disruptive, just… there. It reminds me of the wind chimes at my aunt’s lake house. Sweet, but timid. Easily missed if you’re not paying attention. Background noise that settles into place.
Every instinct I have goes on high alert.
I turn.
And—
Oh.
Oh.
That’s—
Okay.
The new guy pauses just inside the doorway, like he’s assessing the room before committing to it. He’s tall—not in a looming, Magnus way, but in a long, deliberate way, like every inch of him was designed with intention. There’s something precise about how he holds himself. Controlled.
Contained.
His clothes are simple—dark trousers, a fitted vest over a button-down, sleeves rolled just enough to expose his forearms—strong, sculpted with a heft that pulls my gaze.
His clothes seem tailored around him. They’re sharp, but accentuate his toned, hefty frame. The pants stop short of his feet, exposing broad plated toes tipped with dark claws.
His body isn’t skin so much as structure—layered, plated. Gold, or maybe copper, toned segments overlap along his arms in clean, deliberate bands, catching the overhead light with a muted gleam.
He seems… functional. Engineered.
And it doesn’t stop there.
It’s in the line of his jaw, too—strong and defined.
A blunt, leonine shape softened just enough to miss at a distance.
His nose and mouth are a shade darker, along with his hair—if that’s what it is—more like thick, sculpted ridges.
Metal strands, each piece sitting exactly where it should, as if it were placed with intention.
When he breathes, there’s the faintest shift at the corners of his nostrils and two longer teeth—canines—that rest on his lower lip, twitch.
And behind him…
I blink.
A tail.
Not subtle. Not tucked away. A thick segmented length of gold-plated armor that moves with a slow, deliberate weight, each shift accompanied by the faintest—
plink.
…rattle.
My brain registers: Oh. So that’s where that’s coming from.
And when he shifts his stance—
plink.
…clang.
Something stirs low in my chest.
What the hell is that?
“Hello,” he says, voice even and low. “Sorry I’m late to my own meeting.”
No one answers immediately, which seems bizarre.
Magnus gestures once to the open seat halfway down the table. “No worries.”
He nods and steps forward.
rattle.
clink.
It’s quieter this time, but I hear it. I definitely hear it.
I can’t be the only one hearing it, right?
I glance at Jamie.
Jamie is watching him over the edge of his laptop with the kind of interest that says oh good, this is going to be something.
Cool. It’s not just me.
The new guy—or at least new to me because I would have remembered him—moves toward Greg, who is still crouched by the projector like it might bite him.
“I can take a look.” His voice has a resonance to it. Almost like a bell that’s been dampened by velvet.
Greg looks up, visibly relieved. “Be my guest. It’s… not cooperating.”
The new guy sets his laptop down on the table with careful precision before crouching beside him.
plink.
Okay, yeah, no, that is absolutely a sound his body is making.
I lean forward slightly, pretending to adjust my notebook so I can see and hear better.
Up close, it’s even more noticeable. The way his fingers move—too smooth in some places, too deliberate in others. When he reaches for the cable, there’s the faintest click at the bend of his knuckles, like something aligning.
“Which input are you using?” he asks.
“HDMI. Well, I tried HDMI, and then I tried the adapter, and then—”
“Password?” he asks, glancing at Greg’s laptop.
Greg blinks. “Uh. Yeah. One second.” He types it in, muttering under his breath.
The new guy watches the screen, head tilted slightly, and for a second—just a second—I swear there’s a flicker behind his eyes.
Not light exactly.
Like something is calibrating.
And that’s when I really see them.
They’re green.
Not dull, not hazel, not the kind of green you have to squint to notice. Clear and bright green, almost luminous under the overhead lights, like polished glass catching the right angle. It’s the first thing about him that doesn’t feel muted or controlled.
If anything, it’s the opposite.
Eager.
They track the movement on the screen with sharp, deliberate precision, but there’s something underneath that—something that lingers half a beat too long, like he’s taking in more than he strictly needs to.
Or wants to.
My stomach does a weird little drop.
“Try switching back now,” he says.
Greg does as he says, and the projector rouses to life.
The screen fills with a spreadsheet so dense my face involuntary winces.
“Oh, thank gods,” Franklin breathes.
Greg laughs, pushing himself to his feet. “Clang, my friend, you’re a lifesaver.”
Clang.
Of course, that’s his name. I remember it from the staff directory, although there was no picture.
Clang shifts into a smile, and the plates along his neck—overlapping, disappearing beneath his vest as they continue down his back—slide with a soft, cascading friction.
As if to affirm his name, Clang’s body orchestrates his movement.
plink.
…clang.
rattle.
My brain replays it.
Clang straightens, and the movement sends more sweet clatter through the room like an echo that can’t quite decide where to land.
Am I staring?
Fuck, I am absolutely staring.
He turns his head slightly, just enough that our eyes almost meet.
I look down immediately, like a coward.
Cool. Great. Excellent start, Hunter. Really subtle. No notes.
“Thank you, Clang,” Magnus says. “Please take a seat.”
Clang nods once and moves to the open chair across from me.
Closer.
That was a mistake. That was a tactical error on my part, not anticipating proximity.
Because now I can see everything.
The precision. The faint seams—no, not seams, that’s not right, but something like them—at his wrists where metal meets skin where his sleeves pull back. The way the light hits him and doesn’t quite behave.
And his face.
Hot damn.
He’s—
Handsome isn’t the right word. Or it is, but it’s incomplete. It’s like someone built him out of symmetry and intention and then stopped just short of making him familiar.
Striking. That’s the word.
Beautiful, if I’m being honest, which I am not, because this is a budget meeting and I am a professional.
He settles into his chair.
…clang.
He stops moving and the delicate tones cease.
Like a period at the end of a sentence.
I realize, a full second too late, that I’m still looking at him.
He glances up, and this time our eyes meet. There’s a pause. Just long enough to register.
His gaze flicks over my face, quick and precise, like he’s cataloging something.
And then—
The slightest shift in his expression. It’s not quite a smile, but it’s not not a smile.
Something in my chest does a weird, noticeable flip.
Oh.
Magnus clears his throat.
“Now that we’re all here,” he says, “let’s begin.”
I look down at my notebook, pen hovering uselessly over the page. I have no idea what the budget variance is. No idea what Franklin is about to say. And I’m not really sure I care. But I absolutely should.
I have exactly one thought, loud and insistent and impossible to ignore.
Clang.
And immediately following that—
He’s gorgeous.
Oh, I’m in trouble.