Chapter 4 #2
I give him a name that’s real, one of our family’s shell companies, in case he looks into it.
He blinks quickly. “I’m doing a rebrand for Blue Note. Expansion campaign. Rowan wants to keep the vibe underground but not… criminal.”
He chews on his lip. “Could you take a look at it?”
I check the stage, where Kain is busy. “Sure.”
A spark of genuine excitement animates Reef as he springs up from the table, shoving his tablet and phone into the big front pocket of his hoodie.
Interesting. He can remember campaign strategy, but a potential romantic encounter evaporates from his mind in minutes.
Selective memory?
When he grabs his drink and bounces away, I scramble to grab my laptop and bag before I chase after him, my heart pounding.
At the door to the backrooms, he pauses and punches in the code. I try to catch the sequence, but his oversized hoodie blocks my view.
Then he darts through, and I have to rush to follow before it shuts.
The hallway beyond is narrow, with reinforced doors leading to more rooms. Reef hurries to the end and pushes into a security room.
I pause in the doorway, a jolt running through me. I’m standing in the nerve center of the lounge and its crew, and all it took was a conversation about graphic design.
Maybe I never needed to try to seduce Orien at all.
The thought barely crosses my mind before I shake it away. Even if it wasn’t an assignment, there’s no way I could stay away from Orien if he’s in the room.
I let out a whistle as I enter the room. “Wow, this is quite the setup.”
Reef falls into the wheeled chair behind the desk, sets his drink on the desk, and unlocks the computer. “I’ve lost too many laptops, so Rowan has me use the desktop for company work.”
A brief search of the desk locates the mouse, and he opens a folder labeled BNLX23.
“Here it is,” he says, his shoulders hunching. “It’s still in the early phase.”
I grab a second chair to sit and lean in. “Let’s see it.”
He launches into a brisk walkthrough. The new logotype, the reworked color palette, and the balance of grit versus polish.
He pulls up Instagram feeds of comparable venues, then the Blue Note’s old flyers, talking fast, the words tumbling out in a rush.
“They want to keep the name, but Rowan wants to kill the blues note literalism. Like, yes, there’s a saxophone in the logo, but we’re more than a jazz bar.”
Lucky for Reef, my cover story actually leaned on something I know how to do. “What’s the hook for the campaign?”
He switches to a mood board pinned with sepia-tinted band shots, slick candid photos of the staff, candid shots of couples in the booths, and silhouettes on the dance floor.
“They want it to look as if the place has always been here. Not a pop-up, trendy club.”
He clicks again, and an image pops up of a bear and crown, distorted almost beyond recognition behind layers of blue paint.
It’s a common regional symbol, but the specific styling is a near-perfect match to one of ours. “Where’d you get that?”
He grimaces. “Rowan likes to remind people that the Blue Note is about tradition. I sampled it from a city hall mural, but I think the bear will creep people out.”
I set my laptop on the desk beside his keyboard, dig out my own stylus from my bag, and open up a blank canvas. Going to the internet, I pull a handful of images to add to the file.
Reef leans closer, and his sweet Omega pheromones, muted by suppressants, slip into my lungs.
Growing up in a family of Alphas, I haven’t spent much time around Omegas. Do I smell this sweet, too?
I shake off the thought and refocus. “What if, instead of the family crest angle, you used a heron and worked in a microphone?”
As I talk, I do a rough sketch using my image references. “The heron brings to mind the word blue, while also giving a sense of elegance. It’s a classic, and it has a good meaning behind it.”
Reef shoves his glasses up his nose. “What meaning?”
“Herons symbolize patience, accuracy, and striking only when necessary.”
Realizing I might be giving too much away about my knowledge of what the Blue Note Crew does, I hurry to add, “You know, for those times when people still throw beer bottles at the stage and Orien has to step in.”
Reef laughs, delighted. “That’s not bad.” He pulls out his phone. “Can I take a pic of it to show Rowan? He’s the one who owns the lounge.”
“I can email it to you, if you want.”
“Yes!” He snatches up a notepad and starts scribbling down his contact details.
Halfway through the line, the pen drags to a halt, and his brow furrows while he studies the ink on the paper.
Is he remembering that he got a random guy’s phone number earlier? But after a moment, he shakes his head and finishes writing before turning the pad toward me.
I save everything and shoot it over to him.
In his excitement to check for the file, his arm bumps his drink and sends it skidding onto the keyboard tray. The glass tips, spilling vodka.
“Shit—sorry, don’t touch anything,” Reef says, jumping up. “I’ll grab towels. It’s fine.”
He races out, his footsteps fading down the hallway. The silence he leaves behind is a ticking clock.
I check the open door, then look at the tower. I don’t have long.
Moving fast, I unclip the barrette from my hair and roll the device between my fingers until the catch pops. The bottom third folds away, revealing a USB connector with a red light.
I crouch to plug the data crawler into the front port of the tower.
The script is already loaded, and the first window crawls for Vartanian surnames, then secondary connections for finance, corridor, and shell companies.
It pings through the main directory and the unallocated disk space, checking for remnants of the family’s stolen data. Then it sweeps for a half dozen unique serials connected to the breach from last month.
No hits. Nothing in the main directory or the encrypted partitions.
As the progress bar on the deep scan crawls, my pulse hammers in time with Reef’s returning footsteps. I abort the scan, yanking the crawler the second the light turns green.
I snap it closed and clip it back in my hair just as Reef enters, arms full of towels and cleaner.
“Kain’s gonna kill me,” he says as he mops the puddle off the desk and wipes down the keyboard tray. “I’m a disaster before noon.”
“It’s okay,” I say, closing the folder on the laptop so it appears as if I haven’t moved.
He blots the worst of the spill, then sets the keyboard upside down to dry. “It’ll work tomorrow. It always does.”
I gesture at the campaign mockups. “The concepts are strong,” I say, and I mean it.
“You’ve got a good sense of what the place is trying to be. If you embrace the tension, I think it’ll work.”
He beams at the compliment, almost bashful. “Nobody here gives a shit about any of this. Kain tries, but he works in codes, not graphics.”
He turns to me, and the directness of his stare is almost uncomfortable. “It’s nice to talk to someone who actually gets it.”
I feel the urge to turn away, but I don’t. “I’d be happy to take another look at the deck when you get further along.”
“Yeah? That’d be cool.” After wiping his hands on his jeans, he checks the time. “Kain’s probably finished by now. You want a drink? I can comp it.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I say, slipping my laptop into my bag and slinging the strap over my shoulder. “I took up a seat for hours. I should buy at least one drink tonight.”
Reef walks me back through the staff-only hallway.
As we turn the corner at the end of the hallway, I almost collide with Orien. Orien’s hands come up to cup my elbows, and a frisson of heat shoots up my arms and down to my hips as my knees threaten to give.
I have never reacted to an Alpha this way. I have never reacted to anyone this way.
My lips part on a gasp, just as the sound of the band warming up drifts through the wall.
A loose, wandering guitar chord drifts, followed by a crisp snare hit and the throaty complaint of a saxophone being warmed up.
Reef’s whole body snaps toward it with the certainty of a compass needle finding north, and he bolts around me, sneakers squeaking once on the concrete as he rounds the corner as if neither of us exist.
Orien waits for him to go before his attention returns to me, and his hold on my arms flex. “Didn’t expect to see you back here.”
“Reef asked for my opinion on the new campaign,” I say, the words taking a fraction too long to form as my thoughts scatter at his touch.
His thumbs drag slow circles on my elbows. “And?”
“It’s solid.” The hallway narrows to only him. “The place has a clear brand.”
Orien’s nostrils flare, and he steps in until I have to tip my chin up to hold his gaze. I can feel the heat radiating off his chest and smell the dark, resinous pull of an Alpha who isn’t suppressing anything.
“You always give free advice?”
“Only when it’s worth it.”
Satisfaction glints in his eyes, and his hands slide down my forearms to my wrists, his thumbs pressing into the thin skin where my racing pulse gives me away.
The sound that comes from his chest is low and private, meant only for me, and my knees go liquid.
He leans, the stubble on his jaw scraping my temple, his breath warm against my ear. “You’re not ready yet, trouble.”
The words land slowly, moving through heat before they become meaning. When they do, I go rigid.
He releases my wrists and steps back before I can pull away, leaving my skin cold and my pulse loud in my own ears. “Come on. I’ll walk you back.”
I rub the insides of my wrists, forcing my breathing to steady.
Orien is already moving toward the exit without checking if I follow. I trail after him.
This is the mission.
Orien is the target.
I repeat the words in my head, a mantra to counter the heat still burning on my skin. But the fire from his touch consumes the words, leaving only sensation in its wake.