Chapter 16
Chapter
Sixteen
Thomas looked over at an older man—Kate’s father, he assumed.
Since the car service had dropped her off, at least they had her address, and Yagi’s people had dug up some quick intel, promising a deeper dive as soon as possible.
Thomas was a little surprised Kate was still living with her parents.
It also surprised him that her father was wearing a service revolver in an unsnapped shoulder holster, and that he was giving Thomas the hairy eyeball.
Damn it. How much had Kate told the man? How much damage control was Thomas going to need to do?
“Kate? Everything all right?” her father said, his eyes cold and flat, like he was stepping into an interrogation room.
Kate’s own gaze never wavered from Thomas’s, unflinching and determined.
“Dad, it’s fine. I’ll be right back.” She stepped out, pointedly closing the door between her father and them, and nodded toward Thomas’s town car. Her voice dropped to a hiss. “Start walking. I don’t want to have this conversation here.”
As they walked away, Thomas glanced quickly over his shoulder. He noticed one of the wooden blinds parting. Her father was going to be watching, protective. Well, Thomas wasn’t here to abduct Kate, or threaten her.
All he wanted to do was hire her. No crime in that.
“I wanted to apologize for earlier,” he said. “I could have handled all that better.”
“You mean you could have come up with a better cover story if you’d realized that you might need one.”
That was true enough. “Let me explain.”
“How, exactly, are you planning on explaining the starvation and beating of either trafficked people or prisoners?” She stared at him, her expression a war between anger and disgust.
“First, I swear on my mother’s grave, I am not human trafficking,” he said.
Also true—they weren’t even human, and he had documentation that allowed them onto this plane.
Legal on a number of levels, and all of them had agreed, from what he understood.
“Second, I contracted their work because the people who can read this language are very, very rare. I needed them for their expertise.”
“That’s bullshit.”
He blinked. “Excuse me?”
“I spoke with them,” she snapped. “You don’t need someone who can read whatever the hell language that is. You just need to find one specific word, or pictograph, or whatever. A simple image recognition program could handle that more quickly and more efficiently.”
“That’s right,” he agreed. Damn, the woman hadn’t been there a week, and she’d found out all that? From demons?
What were they doing down there, braiding each other’s hair?
“So why didn’t you just do that?” she demanded. “Why didn’t you do what I did?”
Because my programmers keep getting possessed.
Which brought him back around to why he was here in the first place. She wasn’t possessed, psychotic, or even ill, after a few days. She was his best and only candidate. “It’s top secret. I couldn’t trust a programmer with the image.”
“But why is it top secret?”
He barked out a brusque laugh. “Perhaps you don’t understand what ‘top secret’ means.”
She scowled at him. “What I mean is, there’s no possible way I can make any sense of it. No one could. It’s just a cipher, something encrypted. I was assuming that’s the whole point of using it—to keep stuff secret.”
Thomas took a step back, evaluating her.
From what he could tell, she was intelligent, pragmatic, and fearless.
Despite the fact that she looked cute and irritated, she’d survived for four days with some of the most brutal beings he’d ever encountered, and her only war wound was one popped seam.
Even now, despite living at home with her parents and having few financial prospects, she was still standing toe-to-toe with him, and not backing down—something that most millionaire businessmen had a hard time managing.
I like this woman.
She was smart, strong. A powerful combination. Sexy, too, he realized.
He probably shouldn’t focus on that last aspect.
He cleared his throat. “I’d like you to come back to work.”
Her jaw dropped. “Excuse me?”
“You were right. There was an easier way, and you found it,” he said, shifting his voice to the gentle, aw-shucks drawl that had served him surprisingly well in so many business deals.
“It’s too late to keep you from knowing about the, er, code—and as you say, you can’t understand it anyway. So let’s say I trust you by default.”
Her eyes narrowed. “What’s the catch?”
“There is no catch. At least, not for you,” he said. “I’m stuck in a predicament because you wound up going where you weren’t supposed to—”
“Where I was assigned,” she interrupted. “Ginny sent me there.”
Thomas paused, then sighed. “Of course she did.” He felt a headache starting to press behind his eyes. “I’ll have a talk with her. And I can promise that if you take the job, you won’t be reporting to her, or even interact with her.”
Kate tilted her head, surveying him suspiciously. “Why should I come back?”
Now it was his turn to cross his arms. “Last we talked, you’re the one who needed the paycheck.”
He watched as her tawny cheeks flushed a dark rose. Her jerky shrug confirmed what he’d thought—she needed the money. He’d have Yagi do a full work-up on how much, on her whole background. He was tired of being blindsided.
“I can always get another assignment,” she muttered, but her bravado was weak.
“True,” he said, feeling more confident. “But can they match what I’d be willing to pay?”
He then named a number and was gratified to see her eyes go wide. “Holy crap,” she breathed. “For that much, am I supposed to kill somebody, too?”
She was possibly the least professional person he’d ever worked with, but damned if she didn’t make him chuckle.
“No. But I’m going to need you to work with all those documents, by yourself.
There’s nobody else I can trust with those documents, and right now, you’re the only one that can use the scanner. ”
She frowned again, absently pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose in a ridiculously cute offhand gesture. “You trust the guys,” she pointed out. “They’re already working with the documents. Why don’t you have them scan?”
How to explain the limited mental capacity of an Ammonite demon? “That’s not really in their skill set,” he hedged.
“Don’t worry. I’ll train them.” She grimaced at him. “And don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what?” he echoed, baffled.
“That ‘aw, how cute’ patronizing smile. Trust me, I’m a good trainer,” she said, even as a flash of doubt crossed her face. “Besides, even if I work twenty-four-seven, it will take forever by myself. You get fifty guys on scanners, you’ll have it done in a few weeks.”
“Forty-nine guys. We had to, ah, let go of one.”
He pictured the cloud of ash, then shook off the image.
She did have a point—if it worked. “All right. I’ll give you three days to test it,” he relented. “Otherwise, we’re back to just you, and they keep working as they were.”
She took a deep breath. Then he saw her glance back towards the house. The blinds shifted a little. She bit her full lower lip, an action that momentarily distracted him. She had a nice mouth, he noticed.
Why am I noticing that?
Why do I keep noticing her?
She wasn’t all that beautiful. But there was something about her that clicked with him, that made him feel more focused. He couldn’t tell if that was a good thing, or a bad one.
Then her chin went up, and her eyes gleamed. “Add fifteen percent to that,” she said, “and maybe I’ll consider it.”
He suppressed his grin. Now she was negotiating? “Isn’t that a little much for a glorified IT training position?” he drawled with amusement.
“You’re the one who needs me, pal.”
More true than she knew. “Okay,” he said. “But I’ll probably want you to do some other stuff, too. Personally. For me.”
Her eyes went round as dinner plates, and she recoiled, taking a step back.
“Whoa! No, not… no. I mean administrative stuff,” he amended quickly, then wondered if the sudden heat in his face meant he was turning red. “You know. Filing and, er, typing, scheduling meetings, or whatever.”
“Oh. No problem.” She took a deep breath. “There’s one other thing…”
“You want a company credit card, too?” he teased. “Maybe you want the car service to take you to work?”
“The guys,” she said, and her jaw set stubbornly.
She took two steps closer to him, bridging the distance between them, near enough that he could smell the light notes of perfume she was wearing.
Her voice dropped to a whisper. “If I work with them, that means they get treated with decency. We’re talking rest breaks, meals, and absolutely no physical abuse. ”
He stared at her, evaluating her. Admiring her.
“This is a deal-breaker, Thomas,” she said, and her voice rang like hot iron being pounded on an anvil. “I’m not working anywhere that mistreats people like that.”
He felt his chest warm, just a little. Al was probably going to shit kittens, but fuck it. Thomas wanted her. No, he needed her.
Of course kindness would be her deal-breaker. The genuine humanity of it made him happy.
And ashamed.
“Deal,” he said, holding out his hand.
Her hand was small in his, her grip firm.
“Deal,” she said, then laughed, a rueful sound. “Feels like I’m making a deal with the devil.”
“Don’t worry,” he said, his voice dry. “Those need contracts signed in blood.”
And God, didn’t he know that one.