Chapter 35 Rob
ROB
“This is it!” I said, trying to pump some enthusiasm into my voice.
Rolling the window down, I waved at Rodrigo, thinking he would just open the gate, but instead, he walked up to the window.
“Name?”
“Rodrigo, it’s me,” I chuckled.
He raised an eyebrow. “Name?”
“Rob. You know, from IT?”
“Last name?”
“Are you serious? Did you have a brain injury while I was gone?” I laughed.
“Sir, are you going to give me your last name, or do I need to call the police?”
“We don’t call the police,” I countered. “We handle all issues in-house.”
“Sir, hand over your ID.”
“This is fucking ridiculous.” I grabbed my phone and called Becky. She’d take care of this for me.
“Reed Security. This is Becky speaking.”
“Becky, I’m at the gates and Rodrigo won’t let me through.”
“I’m sorry, who is this?”
“You know who this is,” I bit out, glancing over at Krista.
She was eyeing me like I was crazy, like I had made up all of this. That was the last fucking thing I needed.
“I’m sorry, but I really don’t know—”
“It’s Rob. Now open the fucking gates!”
“Sir, you need to leave the property.”
“Fuck this,” I growled, hanging up. I shifted into reverse and hit the gas, the tires squealing as I burned rubber.
“Rob, what’s going on?” Krista shouted, holding out her hands as I suddenly slammed on the brakes.
“They wanna play? I can play.” I shifted into park and hit the gas, revving the engine.
Rodrigo stood at the gate, his eyes wide as I threatened to smash through the metal bars and take the whole place down.
“Open the fucking gates!” I shouted out the window.
“Rob, stop this! It’s insane!”
“You haven’t even seen insane,” I muttered.
When the gates still didn’t open, I shifted into drive and hit the gas. The tires slipped before gaining traction, and then we were flying at the gates.
“Rob! Stop! Stop!”
I was getting close, almost to the point of no return. I was serious. I would tear the fucking gates down if they didn’t let me in.
Rodrigo hit the button for the gate and dove out of the way. They swung open much faster than they normally did, and I zoomed through, spinning the wheel and stopping just short of running over my boss.
We both jerked forward as we came to a stop, and I got the distinct feeling that Krista wasn’t very happy with me.
“What the hell was that?” she whispered.
I shifted into park and flung the door open, glaring at Cap. “Seriously? You locked me out?”
“You’ve been gone so long. I didn’t recognize the name.”
“Not funny. You’re making me look bad in front of my wife.”
He bent over, peering through the windshield. With a grin, he waved to her.
“She looks fine to me. Besides, nothing’s going on around here. I had to do something for fun.”
“You’d better be careful, Cap. You’re starting to sound like Maggie.”
I walked around to Krista’s door and opened it for her, taking her hand to help her out. Sliding my arm around her waist, I walked her over to Cap, hoping he would be on his best behavior.
“Cap, this is Krista.”
Cap tipped his head at her, grinning widely. “You know, we were wondering when Rob would finally find a woman who could put up with him.”
She shot a nervous look at me. “He just tried to drive through your gates. I’m not sure that’s a great example of me handling him.”
“Right, well…we’re all a little crazy around here. Come on. I’ll show you around.”
He spun on his heel, taking off.
“Actually, I was thinking—”
“Come on!” he called. “We’re burning daylight!”
Sighing, I took Krista’s hand. “I’m really sorry about this.”
“Are things always this…”
“Yes. I mean, not all the time,” I said after thinking about it a minute. “Sort of?”
“Which is it?” she hissed.
“Um…”
There wasn’t really a good answer for that. So many things came to mind.
Alec driving through the gates in a tank.
Helicopters flying overhead, firing at us as we shot drones at them.
Maggie with grenades.
Vittoria trying to become an assassin at the age of eleven.
“You know, mostly, things are just like in Montana. Just warmer,” I lied.
But that lie was shot to hell when we got to the elevators and Cap put his palm against the panel.
“What is he doing?”
I scratched the back of my neck, trying to think of a really good way to explain this without making us sound crazy.
“Um…see, we’re a very secure facility, so you have to have your handprint in the system to enter the building unless you have one of us with you.”
“Oh. That doesn’t sound too bad.”
Yeah, but it wasn’t over. I grimaced as Cap then lowered slightly for the retinal scanner.
“And that?”
“Retinal scan,” I answered, as if it was perfectly normal.
I pinched the bridge of my nose as the keypad popped up.
“You have to enter a passcode also?” she asked.
“Yep.” I nodded along, refusing to look at her and see the odd expression I was sure was written all over her face.
“So, if I want to enter this building, I need to have my handprint in the system, do a retinal scan, and have a password,” she reiterated.
Cap grinned over his shoulder. “And the password changes daily.”
Yeah, she totally thought we were psycho.
The doors opened and Cap stepped inside, motioning us forward. Taking Krista’s hand, I tugged her along beside me, giving her a squeeze to ease the worry on her face.
“Don’t worry. You won’t be over here that often. This is the central hub for work.”
“Oh.” The relief in her voice was evident, but I knew that when she got back to our house, she might change her mind about setting foot in Pennsylvania.
“So, this is the lobby,” Cap said, motioning around at the expressive artwork. “A few years ago, the whole building was destroyed.”
“Oh. Fire?” she asked.
I cringed the moment he opened his mouth.
“Yeah, you could say that. We were attacked. I gave the signal to burn the place down.”
“You—” Krista stopped in her tracks, staring at my boss. “You burned your own building down?”
“Well, we were attacked,” he said, almost in confusion. “They were after important documentation. Anything in these files could get any one of us killed.”
Stepping forward with a laugh, I clapped him on the shoulder, squeezing extra hard. “Okay! I think that’s enough of the show and tell for the day. Let’s give Krista a chance to get her bearings before we overwhelm her with information.”
“Yeah, that sounds like a plan,” he grinned. “Though, you should probably show her the panic room while you’re here.”
“Panic room?” she whispered.
“Tomorrow,” I insisted. “We’ll do that tomorrow. It’s been a long day, and we really just want to get some shut-eye.”
As I turned to take Krista home, Cap called out one more time, ruining my day.
“Hey! While you were gone, Knight made some upgrades to your house! He was worried about the mafia!”
I raised my thumb over my head, but internally, I was dying. She was going to leave, and there was nothing I could do about it.