Chapter 35
Professional Misconduct
JULIETTE
One Month Later
I’d checked the time twice. Five times, if anyone was counting.
The executive floor carried the usual polished hum of Maris Key money in motion: low voices, citrus water sweating in glass dispensers, the soft click of Daisy’s nails against her tablet. Sunlight poured through the Gulf-side windows and turned the floor a glossy cream.
Nick entered with a South African tan and absolutely no evidence that city clothes had made him safer.
He wore dark dress slacks, a white shirt open at the throat, sleeves rolled to his forearms, and city boots polished just enough to suggest he had allowed civilization one concession.
Clean steel caught the light at his wrist, and his beard was trimmed shorter than it had been at Mara Khaya, precise enough to be deliberate and reckless enough to be an invitation.
Brynn, who had absolutely no business being near reception, let out a low whistle from somewhere behind Daisy’s desk, and my coffee went down wrong.
He paused just inside reception, not uncertain, exactly. His gaze moved once over the glass walls, the fast shoes, and the dangerous concentration of women with tablets and opinions. His face gave nothing away.
I coughed once into my fist and pretended it was the caffeine that had betrayed me.
Daisy looked up from reception. Her gaze moved from Nick to me, then back to Nick, then down to her tablet with the concentrated restraint of a woman whose entire soul had leaned forward and been told to sit down.
My phone buzzed against my desk.
DAISY: He’s here.
DAISY: Obviously you know this.
DAISY: Should I offer coffee, water, or a company-wide moment of silence?
ME: Coffee. For people actually attending the meeting.
DAISY: Right. Coffee for the meeting. Thoughts and prayers for the lobby.
ME: Daisy.
DAISY: Coffee it is.
His gaze lifted, found me through the glass, and my pulse stopped pretending headquarters was neutral territory.
I stepped back from the glass before Summer could appear in my doorway with her tablet, a folder, and a look that said my personal life had just been added to the agenda.
My desk was clear. My calendar was blocked. My expression was neutral enough to pass a casual inspection by someone who didn't share my DNA.
Unfortunately, Summer shared my DNA.
A knock landed on my open door.
She stood there in navy trousers and a silk blouse, her hair clipped back. “He’s early.”
“He’s punctual.”
“That wasn't criticism.”
“Your face occasionally has range.”
Her mouth twitched. “You’re not coming into the meeting.”
“I know.”
“I mean it.”
“I also mean it.”
Summer studied me for one quiet second. “Good.”
Emme had designed my office to lower blood pressure on contact. The feng shui alone had carried me through client meltdowns, vendor implosions, and one deeply unfortunate champagne saber incident in Provence.
Unfortunately, Emme had not accounted for Nick Mercer in the house.
My fingers tightened once around my pen.
Summer saw it. Of course she did.
“He made one request,” she said.
The pen stopped moving.
“Same rules. No favors. No one wondering what got him through the door.”
I set the pen down before I clicked it into dust. “Then go make him earn it.”
“That was already the plan.”
Summer left with the faintest smile.
The meeting lasted fifty-three minutes. I didn’t count the seconds, because even I have limits.
I signed two contract approvals, answered four emails, rejected one proposed Azores itinerary because the client’s husband had requested “authentic danger with full concierge support,” and made it eleven minutes before I left my office with a folder I didn’t need.
Daisy looked up as I stopped beside her desk, which sat in a tragically useful position outside the main conference room.
“Tell me about your life,” I said quietly.
“While you stand here and spy?”
“I am mentoring you.”
“Into federal prison?”
“Into discretion.”
“You know Summer and Annie can see you.”
Through the glass, Summer sat at the head of the table with her tablet angled beside her water glass.
Annie had a spreadsheet open and one eyebrow raised, which meant someone had placed the phrase “flexible budget” within striking distance.
Gabe Vaughn sat across from Nick with his shoulders squared, younger than the title he had carried for the last month but not soft under it.
Nick didn't lean back or take over the room. When Gabe spoke, Nick wrote something down, and when Summer slid a document across the table, he read the relevant paragraph before answering.
Daisy brought coffee in at minute twenty-one and exited with the speed of a woman who had survived prolonged baritone exposure at close range.
I went back to my office.
My phone buzzed.
DAISY: He thanked me for the coffee.
ME: That is the standard response to receiving coffee, Daisy.
DAISY: In that voice? No.
I turned the phone facedown.
At minute fifty-three, the conference room door opened.
Gabe came out first, his expression controlled but bright around the edges. Engaged, not intimidated.
Good.
Annie followed, thumbs moving over her phone, probably recalculating the cost of three security redundancies Nick had identified in under twelve minutes.
Summer paused in the doorway with Nick. I couldn't hear her through the glass, but I knew my sister’s negotiation posture by the level chin, calm shoulders, and sharp eyes.
Nick said something.
Summer’s face softened for half a second, then she extended her hand.
He took it.
Whatever they had agreed to, Nick had somehow made a handshake look indecently responsible.
Nick turned from Summer and looked through the glass, directly at Daisy’s desk.
Daisy, traitor and future defendant, lifted one finger and pointed down the hall toward my office.
I returned to my desk with all the dignity available to a woman caught loitering outside her own conference room.
He stopped at my threshold.
“Mr. Mercer,” I said.
“Ms. Wilder.”
“Congratulations. You survived the committee.”
His gaze moved over my face. “Not my most dangerous field assignment.”
“Give Summer time.”
A crease touched the corner of his mouth.
He stepped inside but stopped several feet away, leaving the door open and the space between us defensible.
“How did it go?” I asked.
“You know how it went.”
“I wasn’t in the meeting.”
His mouth shifted, and then, uncharacteristically, he laughed. “No. You were not.”
I held his gaze with the full authority of a CEO who had been visibly standing beside Daisy’s desk for nine minutes.
The month between Mara Khaya and this office had followed him through my door. Daily texts. Calls about nothing urgent and everything that mattered. Conversations that started practical and ended with one of us reluctant to hang up.
“Phase one starts next week,” he said. “Remote review first. Two site audits in November. Gabe keeps daily control. Summer handles escalation. I build the system. I don’t replace the team.”
“And Mara Khaya?”
“Through December thirty-first.”
“And here?”
“Base of operations beginning in January.”
“Defined boundaries,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Very mature of you.”
His gaze dropped to my mouth, then returned to my eyes. “I’m told it happens.”
“Sofia?”
His jaw shifted, a small movement. “I told her. Her mother too. We’ll figure out a schedule that works. Virginia is easier from Florida than Africa.”
“You’re not trying to solve everything by January.”
“No.” He looked at me. “But I am working on it.”
The office went very quiet.
Somewhere beyond the glass, Daisy laughed over the phone. A printer started. The ordinary world continued its administrative nonsense while Nick stood in my office and changed the shape of January.
I reached for my coffee. My hand wasn't steady, so I let the mug stay where it was.
His gaze dropped to it.
“Careful,” I said. “If you keep observing me, I’ll start billing you.”
“I’ve seen your rates.”
“And yet you accepted.”
“I negotiated danger pay.”
A laugh slipped out before I could stop it. His eyes warmed, and the room lost another degree of oxygen. I stood, no longer convinced my desk offered anything useful besides distance.
“I assume dinner is still theoretical.”
“No.”
“No?”
“I don’t make theoretical conditions.”
My stomach tightened.
He had said it through a phone screen and too much distance: dinner, a door he was allowed to lock, and conditions instead of promises.
With Nick, that was the promise.
“Where?” I asked.
“Mar Azul. Seven-thirty.”
My mouth opened.
“How, exactly, did Mar Azul enter the evidence file?”
“I have my ways.”
That smile threatened again, small and devastating.
I folded my arms. “Are you picking me up?”
“Yes.”
“At my house?”
“No. At the grocery store.”
I rolled my eyes. “You know that makes this look like a date.”
His gaze moved to the open doorway, then back to me. “That’s because it is one.”
I breathed out, slow enough to pass for composure.
“I’ll pick you up at seven,” he said.
“Seven-fifteen.”
“Seven.”
“Bossy.”
“Patient,” he said. “For a month.”
I stayed upright and moved one pen a quarter inch to the left because apparently that was what remained of my self-control.
Then he was gone.
He walked away, and my manners, eyesight, and moral flexibility handled the rest.
Dress slacks.
Absolutely not.
Field pants had been bad enough.