Chapter Five Cole #2
My jaw tightens. No one can access those kinds of records without my permission, but giving it would feel like handcuffing myself and swallowing the key.
“I’m going. I met with Tyler yesterday for our first check-in. I’m doing everything that’s been asked of me.”
“Are you, though?” Jack leans forward, his voice dropping. “Because doing the bare minimum and actually working on the problem are two different things. We both know that.”
I want to argue, to defend myself…
But he’s right.
“The skills that make you great at your job got you in trouble in your personal life,” Jack continues. “You need to figure out how to separate the two. How to turn off that part of your brain when it’s not work-related.”
“I’m working on it,” I say, and I mean it. Mostly. I think about the tracking app I still haven’t deleted.
Behind the counter, Madison strikes again. “Order for Jess-eye-ka? Jess-eye-kuh?”
“It’s Jessica,” a tired voice says.
“Oh!” Madison brightens. “That’s so much easier.”
“Good,” Jack continues. “Because I need you, Matthews. This company needs you. But not if you’re going to be a liability.” His expression relaxes slightly. “And I say this as your friend, not just your boss: you need this. Not for the job. For you.”
Before I can respond, I hear a voice amplify behind me.
“Oh my god, Hailey, that’s the guy from the trail?”
I turn reflexively, and there she is, standing directly behind our table, looking at me with an expression of surprise. Her friend, a petite woman with light-brown skin and auburn hair, is looking between us with undisguised enthusiasm.
“Cole,” Hailey says, and I instantly love the way my name sounds coming off her tongue. “Hi.”
“Hailey.” I stand without thinking and Jack rises too, ever the gentleman. I shift my cup so COKE faces my body. “This is…unexpected.”
“Good unexpected?” she asks, a small smile playing at her lips.
“Definitely good.” The words come out before I can second-guess them.
Her friend wears a broad smile, which she beams at Jack, then Hailey. “Well, don’t be rude. Introduce us.”
“Right.” Hailey gestures to her companion. “This is Rachel, my best friend and coworker. Rachel, this is Cole.”
“Hiking Emergency Guy, right?” Rachel asks, like she doesn’t already know. “Hailey told me all about it.”
But what I hear is that Hailey told her about me.
“Just happened to be in the right place at the right time,” I say, fighting the urge to ask what exactly Hailey said. “This is Jack Morrison, my boss.”
“Cole and I served together in Afghanistan. Now we just fight security threats,” Jack adds, balancing that extremely cheesy line with firm handshakes for both of them.
“Much safer,” Rachel says with a grin. “Usually.”
There’s a moment of awkward silence, the four of us standing between tables while other customers navigate around us. I’m too aware of how close to me Hailey is standing—and of the way she’s looking at me with that wickedly sharp gaze.
“Well,” Jack says, checking his watch with exaggerated obviousness, “I actually need to get back for a call with a client. Matthews, why don’t you stay, finish your coffee? No need to rush back. Just have that report to me by tomorrow morning.”
I shoot him a look that he completely ignores.
“Oh, and I need to get going, too,” Rachel says, her tone matching Jack’s theatrical timing. “I’ve got that thing. You know, the thing I told you about.”
“What thing?” Hailey asks, confused.
“The very important thing that I absolutely cannot miss.” Rachel’s holding up her purse and jacket, like they’re evidence of the nonexistent appointment she can’t miss. “I’m leaving. You should stay, though. Weren’t you saying you could use another cup of coffee?”
The two of them are conspiring, and it’s about as subtle as a brick through a window. But I’m definitely not complaining.
“I’ll see you back at the office,” Jack says to me, clapping my shoulder. He pauses, looking me dead in the eye. “Whenever, Coke. Really.”
I’m going to murder him in his sleep.
And just like that, they’re gone, Rachel following Jack toward the door while throwing a not-at-all-subtle wink back at Hailey.
“That was…” Hailey starts.
“Incredibly obvious?” I finish, rubbing the back of my neck.
“I was going to say ‘sweet,’ but yeah, ‘incredibly obvious’ works, too.” She gestures to the table where Jack and I were sitting. “Should we sit? Unless your boss was lying and you really do need to get back to work?”
“Jack basically just gave me the rest of the afternoon off.” I pick up my coffee and take a sip, testing its temperature. It’s gone cold, but with Hailey in front of me, it’s hard to care. “What are you drinking?”
She glances at her nearly empty cup. “Vanilla latte. But I can—”
“Let me get you another one.” The words come out more insistently than I intended. “I mean, if you want. No pressure.”
Her smile widens. “That would be nice. Thank you.”
I head to the counter to order, giving myself a mental pep talk while I wait. Don’t be weird. Just be normal.
Madison perks up when she sees me coming. “Back already, Coke?”
“It’s Cole.”
She nods, giving me a smidge of side-eye. “Right. What can I get you, Cole?”
“A vanilla latte, please. For Hailey.”
Her brow furrows, the marker poised over the cup. She mouths the name once, then twice. “How do you spell that?”
“H-A-I-L-E-Y. Hailey.”
“Got it.” She scribbles confidently. “Anything else?”
“That’ll do it. Thanks.” I pay, and while I wait, Madison calls across the café again. “Order for Hayride! I have a vanilla latte for Hayride!”
A guy in a beanie at the pickup counter looks at her like she’s grown a second head. “Did you just say ‘Hayride’?”
“That’s what’s on the cup!”
I clear my throat, stepping up to the counter. “I think that one’s mine. For Hailey.”
“Oh!” Madison beams when she sees me. “Hayride, Hailey. Potato, potato.”
After a beat of consideration I know I’ll regret, I ask, “Don’t you mean ‘po-tay-to, po-tah-to’?”
“Not all of us took French in high school, Coke. You don’t have to be rude about it.”
I take the cup without another word and return to the table, where Hailey is sitting comfortably with her hands folded in her lap.
Seeing her all prim and contained makes me wonder what it looks like when she lets herself unravel. I force that thought out of my head as I settle into the chair across from her.
I set the latte down in front of her, label facing out.
She looks at it, then looks at me, then back to the cup. “Does that say—”
“Hayride.”
“Hayride.”
“That’s you, apparently.”
“How…festive.” A laugh cracks out of her, and those stunning eyes return to mine. “And what did she write on yours?”
I sigh, a mischievous smile on my lips.
“Let me guess…‘Coke’?”
I heave an exaggerated sigh. “She called me Coke, so Jack is calling me Coke, and now I think I’ve been legally renamed.”
“Oh my God.” She’s grinning now, head tilted toward the counter. “Is she okay?”
“I think she’s a person being slowly overridden by autocorrect.”
“That’s exactly what she is. She’s a phone in a human costume.”
“Coke and Hayride,” I say. “Sounds like an unsuccessful country duo.”
“With one mediocre album.”
“And a regrettable Christmas single.”
She’s still laughing as she takes a sip of her latte.
“So,” I say, “it’s kind of wild running into you here.”
“I guess Fort Collins is smaller than I thought,” she replies, wrapping her hands around the warm cup. “Plus, this is the best coffee near the hospital. I come here before most of my shifts.”
I file that information away before I can stop myself, then immediately feel guilty about it.
“I keep thinking about how lucky we were that you had rappelling gear in your pack.” She studies me over the rim of her mug. “You said you always carry it?”