Chapter Twenty-Six Meet the Team
Evie followed Tommy down the hall into a room that, like everything else on the Consulting floor, looked as if it belonged in a high-end architectural magazine.
The walls were a smooth, matte charcoal gray, with soft, recessed lighting tracing the ceiling in precise, geometric lines.
A rectangular black glass table sat at the center, surrounded by ten white and chrome chairs.
One of them, clearly Thorn’s, was slightly larger and reinforced but still matched the sleek, modern aesthetic of the rest of the room.
A massive screen framed in brushed chrome dominated the back wall, currently displaying a slow slideshow of city skylines glowing against the night.
In front of each chair sat an open Supernova Exilis, the compact model from Sloane Tech’s Executive line, its screen glowing with the indigo login interface of Nyx, the Consulting network.
A glass of water accompanied each workstation, and to one side, a small coffee bar gleamed, where Lana stood preparing coffee and boiling water for tea.
Tommy walked over to the table and pulled out the second chair on the right. “This will be your seat going forward. I sit at the head, Nissa to my right, and Thorn to the left.” He smiled. “Lana sits next to Thorn, and the rest fill in the table.”
“How many people work here?” Evie asked, sitting down and reaching for the glass of water, her throat suddenly dry at the thought of meeting everyone at once.
“Counting myself, Nissa, Lana and now you, seven. And Thorn occasionally helps out.” He added the last part just as Thorn entered the room and immediately swept Evie into a bear hug that lifted her clear off her feet, followed by Nissa and three people, two men and a woman, that she didn’t know.
"Hello, Mali?a," Thorn kissed her temple before setting her back down. "It is good to see you."
"Thorn, buddy, you just saw her yesterday." Tommy shook his head as the others in the room lined up for coffee, looking amused as Evie smiled in delight at Thorn’s affectionate greeting.
"It is still good to see her." Thorn shrugged as he let her go and walked around the table to take his seat.
As Evie sat beside Nissa, the other woman winked and passed her a sticky note. “You’re username and password to the system.” She explained. “You’ll have to change your password the first time you log in and then every three months.
Evie nodded, smiling her thanks as Tommy took his place at the head of the table, waiting as everyone grabbed their coffee or tea and took their seats.
When everyone was seated, Tommy stood up, his expression bright and cheerful. “Afternoon, everyone. This should be a quick meeting. I want to introduce you all to Evie Stanley.”
He gestured toward her, and Evie smiled at the group, giving a quick, slightly awkward wave.
“Evie recently graduated summa cum laude from Columbia University with a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science, specializing in Intelligent Systems. She also holds research credits in Affective Computing and Human-AI Interaction, and she received the Dean’s Award for Innovation for her capstone project. ”
Evie felt her cheeks burn as Tommy went on, and everyone except Nissa and Thorn looked at her with open surprise. She noticed he didn’t mention what her capstone project was, which made sense if he intended to integrate it here later.
“She’s joining Sloane Consulting as our new Lead Systems Architect,” Tommy continued, “and she’ll be helping me develop the technology and equipment that will make your jobs safer and more efficient. Eventually, when she’s comfortable taking it over, she’ll lead a small team of designers.”
Evie glanced at him in surprise, then realized she should have expected it. If he planned to expand the number of contractors, her workload would grow quickly.
“So, from now on, you can come to either of us with your ideas, requests, or needs. Her office is to the right of mine, at the back.”
He paused, scanning the table. “I guess that takes us to introductions. Obviously, you know Thorn and his background. Nissa, do you want to fill Evie in on what she doesn’t know about you, and then we’ll move around the table to Paula, Aaron, Cole, and Lana?”
“I think she knows most of it.” Nissa furrowed her brow, trying to recall what she had already told her. “I think the only thing you wouldn’t know is that I was recruited into Mossad for their Combat Intelligence Collection Corps after my military service. Or did we discuss that?”
Evie shook her head, impressed. “I knew you were Mossad before you joined Shin Bet, but not what you did there.”
“And I still can’t tell you exactly what I did.” Nissa chuckled warmly. “But I’m sure you can draw your own conclusion.”
“So that’s why Mom never noticed you when I asked you to follow her,” Evie realized. She had often wondered how Della never noticed Nissa, whom she had spent time with socially, tailing her when Evie wanted to make sure she wasn’t drinking again.
“Well, that and a variety of wigs,” Nissa said with a smirk before nodding toward the blonde woman sitting on Evie’s other side.
Evie turned toward her, smiling as she waited for the introduction.
The woman was taller than both Evie and Nissa, standing around five feet seven, and fairly muscular, as shown by her toned arms and calves.
She had ash-blond hair, bright cornflower-blue eyes, and that effortlessly “girl-next-door” prettiness.
“Paula Denton,” she said shortly, offering a polite but distant smile. “Formerly with the CIA.”
She didn’t elaborate, and after a brief, awkward silence, the blonde man across from her cleared his throat, drawing Evie’s attention.
He was tall, probably over six feet, though she couldn’t tell by how much. He was shorter than the man sitting beside him and Thorn, but taller than Tommy. With broad shoulders, dirty blond hair, and blue eyes, he looked like someone who had probably been a quarterback and homecoming king.
“Aaron Denton,” he said with a warm smile, though his eyes flicked over her appraisingly. “Also former CIA. But I’ll add that my wife and I both graduated from Harvard Law.”
Evie smiled and inclined her head politely.
If he hadn’t said they were married, she might have assumed they were siblings.
They both had that clean, all-American kind of good looks that were blandly inoffensive and slightly boring.
The way Aaron mentioned Harvard felt more like an attempt to one-up her than to provide context.
“Hi!” The man next to Aaron, Cole, leaned forward with a warm smile. “Nice to finally meet you, I’m Cole Wright, former army, been out for about two years.”
Evie felt her smile become genuine. Cole was effortlessly warm and welcoming, and seemed genuinely thrilled to meet her. Tall and slender with sandy brown hair and pale blue-grey eyes, he also appeared to be the type of person you would see, but not notice, if that made sense.
“And we met in the reception area.” Lana smiled at her from Coles' other side. “But I’ll wait until our coffee date before I go too in-depth with the background.”
“That’s everyone for now. Recruitment is a slow process, and I’m looking for the best.” Tommy stretched as he stood, letting out a low groan. “I’m sure you’ll all get to know one another over the next few weeks, but for now, you’re free to go, unless Nissa has something she needs to cover.”
“Just need to go over some quick housekeeping things.” She logged on to her computer, and a second later, she was sharing her screen with the TV monitor at the back of the room.
“Lana and I have finished the new reporting system and uploaded it. This will help streamline the process and ensure that all reports follow the same format. When you have a chance, please review and update your past reports using this format. There’s no rush on that; they’ve already been submitted, but don’t procrastinate on it either. ”
“Oh, that’s much simpler,” Cole remarked, nodding in approval as Nissa scrolled through the new reporting program. “Nice job.”
“That’s what we were hoping.” Nissa smiled. “Other than that, please make sure all expense claims for this quarter are in by the end of next week if you want to get reimbursed.”
She disconnected from the screen at the back of the room and logged off the computer. “That’s it for me.”
“Perfect, then everyone but Cole and Nissa may leave.”
"I'm looking forward to working with you all." Evie smiled as everyone else stood up and left the room, Thorn giving her another huge hug and telling her he would see her at dinner that night before heading off. When it was just the four of them, Tommy grinned.
“Before I give Evie the grand tour of the rest of the floors, I wanted to ask if you two could train her in self-defence for my peace of mind."
“Tommy…” Evie sighed. “You already made me take self-defence classes, remember?”
She had hated every second of them. Fighting wasn’t her strong suit, and even Thorn had shaken his head in dismay more than once during their sessions.
“You are improving,” Thorn said mildly as he helped her off the mat. “At this rate, you will be proficient by the time you are eighty.”
Evie groaned and put her hands in the small of her back, stretching to relieve the ache. Even when Thorn went easy on her, he still managed to throw her every time. “Maybe I should just get a gun.”
“In New York?” He raised an eyebrow. “You would have better luck winning the lottery. But yes, perhaps I could help you apply for a concealed carry permit, purely for my amusement.”
The memory made her smile, and she was pulled from it when Tommy came around the table and gently squeezed her shoulders, helping her to her feet.
“Nissa also has a ballet background,” he said, “and she can show you how to use your dance training to fight and how to use your opponent’s size against him.” He grinned. “Which is where Cole comes in.”
“Looking forward to being the bad guy,” Cole chuckled, giving her a quick salute before following Nissa toward the door.
“Seven a.m. tomorrow morning.” Nissa smiled over her shoulder. “Don’t be late.”