Daniel pulled a pair of sweatpants over his basketball shorts and zipped up his fleece hoodie. He walked out of the bathroom, into the living room, and just shook his head. Quentin sat on the sofa in a short-sleeved T-shirt.
“Are you sure you’re not going through some kind of male menopause or something?” Daniel asked.
“I’ve always been warm-blooded.” Quentin looked over his shoulder and chuckled. “Dramatic much?”
“Nope.” Daniel forced the zipper all the way up and pulled the hood over his head, cinching the drawstring underneath his chin. “I freeze my balls off whenever you’re here.”
“Everyone knows I like it on the chilly side. They should have warned you before FinCEN agreed to this joint taskforce.” He held up several sheets of paper. “Did you notice how the Wi-Fi activity in most of the Uruguay properties escalated in July?”
“Yeah, but I didn’t find it unusual,” Daniel said, lifting the sheets from Quentin’s grasp. “That’s the heat of soccer season. Die-hard fans are willing to spend money to stream their favorite teams.” He grabbed his iPad. “But it’s worth making a note. The bad guys could be thinking that same thing. It would be smart to use a time when Wi-Fi activity is up to funnel more logins.”
“And we’ve already established that the people behind this scheme are smart,” Quentin said.
“Too damn smart,” Daniel grunted. The iPad dinged with a notification that the department meeting with FinCEN would be starting in another five minutes. “I’ve got my weekly conference with headquarters. How long you plan on staying?”
“I’ll be here a while.” Quentin gestured toward the kitchen. “I brewed a fresh pot of coffee while you were in the shower. Grab yourself a cup. Stay warm.”
He snorted a laugh. “Thanks.”
He could use a cup of coffee for both the warmth and the caffeine boost. Too many late nights of trying to find a way into Trendsetters’ security had him dog-ass tired. But a cup of coffee was no longer just a cup of coffee for him. There was an irrevocable association with a certain coworker tied to it. He doubted he’d ever be able to drink coffee again without thinking of his morning ritual with Samiah.
Not reaching for her again last night had been the hardest fucking thing ever. In retrospect, Daniel recognized that he should be grateful she’d had the presence of mind to slow things down. But another part of him—the part that had tortured him throughout the night by mentally continuing past the point when Samiah had stopped them—that part resented the hell out of the way his night had ended.
Moments after they’d pulled apart, Samiah had packed up her computer and hauled it out of the office. And he’d come back to this empty apartment. Alone.
Forgoing the coffee, he went into the computer room and fell into the rolling desk chair. He shut his eyes tight, trying his best to quell the barrage of images barreling to the forefront of his mind at the very thought of her. He couldn’t do this now. He had a video conference call in two minutes. He needed to funnel all his energy into delivering a credible explanation of why things weren’t moving fast enough on this job.
Not that anyone at FinCEN had expectations that weren’t being met. It was his own internal timeline that was pushing him to work harder and stress over the fact that he hadn’t been able to breach Trendsetters’ security.
The lack of movement on this job—on finding even one solid lead—was driving him crazy.
Yeah, that’s not the only thing about the job that’s driving you crazy.
He needed to focus. Until he was able to get out of his own head and do his damn job, he wouldn’t be good for shit. He logged into the video conferencing software. Lowell Dwyer’s melon-shaped head took up the entire screen.
“Collins,” Daniel said, letting everyone know he was there.
“Hey, Daniel.” It was Thaddeus Mitchum. “My ex-sister-in-law said you’ve got to go to a restaurant called County Line. She said they have the best barbecue in Texas.”
“Bold claim for such a big state,” Daniel replied.
“Bring some back with you when you wrap up this job,” Thad tacked on.
Dwyer cleared his throat. “Now that Collins is here, that’s everyone. Why don’t we start with you, Daniel. What do you have for us on the Austin job?”
He fed them a short overview about the various Trendsetters employees he’d been looking into and how being put on the special project for the Leyland Group was both a help and a hindrance.
“The plus side is that several of those we had on the initial subject list are also on this special project team, so it gives me an opportunity to get a better read on them. There are a couple who have stuck out to me by virtue of their personalities. One guy, Jake Gorge, keeps talking about his fantasy football team and how he’s hoping to win the big prize at the end of the season. I’ve heard a bit of gossip that he may have a gambling problem.”
“One big enough that he needs to launder money to fund it?” his supervisor asked.
Daniel shrugged. “I haven’t gone deep enough to ferret that out, but I’ve flagged him.” He adjusted his monitor so that he could be more centered in the screen shot. “Of course, the drawback to being put on this new team is that I won’t be able to make a case to join the Cybersecurity Department.”
“That was a long shot anyway. You’ve got other mechanisms in place. Utilize those to infiltrate their system, even if it takes a little longer than you’d like. Remember, Collins, you don’t take down an operation of this size overnight. You millennials need to learn patience.”
If his supervisor caught wind of what Daniel had been doing, he would be singing a different tune. The litany of things he should be working on could fill this entire room. He had a list of potential targets to investigate. Gigabytes of files his FinCEN colleagues had managed to access awaited his review. That’s what he should have been doing instead of seeing how far he could get his tongue down Samiah’s throat.
He’d gotten it pretty damn far.
Fuck. Stay focused!
As the others gave a rundown of their current investigations, Daniel used the time to gain some control over his thoughts. He needed to get his head back in the game and stop allowing himself to get derailed from his overall goal.
“I’m sure everyone has noticed that Stewart isn’t here.” Dwyer’s deep voice corralled his attention away from his musing. “He’s gone under. He got one of the suspects in the Kolinsky case to flip. The cooperator gave him key information on how the oligarch was able to gain access to those millions of credit reports. It may be the thing that cracks this case wide open.”
Daniel’s muscles froze as a deep chill spread from his core throughout his entire body. While he was here in Austin doing his best imitation of the nerdy love interest in a rom-com, Bryce Stewart was kicking ass and taking names on his undercover investigation. Why not just hand the Vegas job over to him right now?
There was more at stake than simply one-upping his office adversary. This job was his opportunity to prove that he’d chosen the right career path. If he closed his eyes, he could hear Joelle’s voice in his head, telling him that he was wasting his skills working in the public sector. Those words had affected him more than he was willing to admit. His need to show her—to show himself—that he’d made the right choice when he joined FinCEN was as important to him as getting the best of Bryce.
And just like that, Daniel knew what he had to do.
When he arrived at Trendsetters the next day, he was refocused and ready to tackle the tasks Lowell Dwyer had entrusted him to complete. His original game plan had been to devote 40 percent of his time to doing Trendsetters’ work and the other 60 percent to ferreting out whoever was behind this money-laundering scheme.
Somewhere along the way, he’d lost sight of his goal. The allure of playing around in all these cool coding languages, falling into the routine of a normal tech-world job, had distracted him from his plan.
That all stopped today.
For the next three hours, Daniel switched between the five windows opened on his monitor, all the while surreptitiously scanning the iPad that lay flat on his desk, partially obscured by several folders and printouts. On the iPad was one of the databases he’d managed to infiltrate. It showed him the login data for every Trendsetters employee, which allowed him to track how long they were accessing the system both at work and remotely.
With this information he could record the IP addresses and have the guys back at FinCEN run them. If anyone sought entry into their work files from a remote address while abroad, it would give him an idea of who was possibly allowing someone else to get into their system. It wouldn’t be the smoking gun they were looking for, but it was a valuable data point.
Daniel was so focused on work that he didn’t hear Samiah’s approach. She tapped him on the shoulder, causing him to jerk to attention.
His body’s reaction to her touch was instantaneous, his skin growing hot and tight. He looked up and was catapulted back to last night and the exquisite feel of palming her curvy ass.
Holy. Fuck.
Daniel cleared the lust from his throat before answering, “Hey.” He removed his headphones and let them hang around his neck.
“Are you actually doing the impossible?” Samiah asked. He frowned, not following. “Working without coffee,” she clarified with a laugh. “You didn’t get any this morning.”
“Um, yeah.” His chuckle held a lot less amusement than hers had. “I came in extra early. Got my cup before you even got here.”
“Oh.” Her head reared back slightly. “Okay. Well, what do you feel like eating for lunch? I’m in the mood for a burger. Maybe we can grab sliders at that pub around the corner?”
Daniel removed the headphones from around his neck and set them on the desk. He’d rather strut down the hallway in nothing but combat boots than do what he was about to do, but it was necessary. He’d succumbed to too many distractions already, this preoccupation with Samiah being the most intrusive.
“I know it was my idea to have the standing lunch date, but I’m not sure that’s the best thing anymore,” he said. “This new project is going to have all of us busy. I think it’s better if I just grab a quick bite here at my desk and work through lunch these next few days.”
He immediately felt like a steaming pile of elephant shit.
Her brows shot up before dipping into a deep V with her frown.
“Okay,” she finally said. “I guess that makes sense.” There was a crispness to her voice that hadn’t been there before. “Although, I don’t see why bouncing ideas off each other over a couple of burgers wouldn’t be considered working.”
God, he hated this.
“It’s just…it’s not a good idea,” Daniel said.
The seconds that ticked by were some of the most uncomfortable of his life. Her shoulders straightened, her chin lifting as she stared down at him. If not for the nerve jumping in her stiff cheek, Daniel would have thought his words were no big deal.
“Fine,” she said. The word was clipped. Final.
With that she turned and started back toward her office.
“Samiah—” Daniel called in a voice that was barely a whisper.
Letting her walk away was the smart move here. The only move. Hell, he could subvert Trendsetters’ security tomorrow and see this job come to an end. What would he say to her then? Sorry about lying to you? We’ll probably never see each other again, but thanks for lighting my world on fire with that kiss, and for paying my salary with your tax dollars?
Yeah, that would go over well.
He put the headphones back on and returned his attention to his computer screen. He needed to finish up this Austin job so that he could move on to the next. It would be better for everyone.
* * *
Samiah pitched her head back and gloried in the rays of sunshine streaming through the trees overhead, welcoming the warmth on her face. She’d happened upon the rarest of rare finds, an empty bench in what was possibly her favorite spot in the city, the Japanese garden in the botanical gardens at Zilker Park. An oasis in the middle of the city, teeming with brightly colored flowers, willowy trees, and ponds filled with lily pads, this was the place she came to when she needed to get outside of her own head and just exist.
She definitely needed it today.
She balanced the pen and steno pad on her knee, and read over the impressive list of ideas she’d brainstormed in the short time she’d been out here. She’d debated whether she wanted to bring anything work-related to her favorite sanctuary, especially while on her lunch break, but decided that when it came to her app, this was the perfect spot to work. She didn’t want Just Friends to feel like a job. It should bring joy.
She was due a little joy after the sour taste left in her mouth yesterday following Daniel’s rebuff. It had hurt, but she was no longer angry.
Okay, so she was a little angry, and maybe just a bit confused.
She’d prepared herself, knowing things would now feel different between them. You didn’t spend several minutes with a guy’s tongue down your throat without expecting a shift in how you interacted with each other. But that complete one-eighty? No, she hadn’t expected that.
His brush-off had bruised her already tender ego, but it had also been the wake-up call she’d needed. After ending her relationship with Craig, the last thing she should have done was walk into this thing with Daniel.
She had yet to define exactly what it was that had blossomed between them over these last couple of weeks. A few lunches and a single weekend of hiking—something she’d wanted to do anyway, but could never find someone to do it with—did not a relationship make. That kiss, however, had placed them well past the friendly coworker mark.
That kiss.
When she looked back on this period years from now, she would be able to pinpoint the moment they’d taken a wrong turn. If it weren’t for that kiss, this thing with Daniel wouldn’t be anything more than a really nice friendship with a dose of lighthearted flirting thrown in.
In a perfect world, they could forget about that kiss and go back to being friends. But the world wasn’t perfect. Although that kiss had been close.
She closed her eyes and sucked in a slow, calming breath, seeking the peace she’d found when she’d first happened upon this bench.
Maybe if she gave it some time, gave herself a little space, she could approach Daniel with an offer of friendship and nothing more. It was something to consider.
But not yet. She was still too deep in her feelings to entertain thoughts of being his friend.
Her phone vibrated with a text. She slipped her phone from her jacket pocket and her heart jumped into her throat at the sight of Denise’s number. Samiah immediately calmed herself down. If there was an emergency with the baby, her sister or Bradley would call instead of texting. Goodness, she was going to give herself a heart attack if she didn’t stop jumping into worst-case scenario mode every time she heard from her sister.
You free to talk? Denise’s text read.
Instead of texting back, Samiah called. “Hey, what’s up?”
“Hey,” came her sister’s surprised greeting. “I didn’t call because I didn’t want to disturb you if you were in a meeting.”
“Nope, we’re good. I’m taking an extended lunch break. What’s up?” she asked again.
“I need a favor.”
“It’s too early to ask me to babysit.”
“Har har,” Denise said with a snort. “Although, now that I think about it, this is another form of babysitting.”
“What is it?”
“Bradley is teaching eighth graders this year, and part of the curriculum is job shadowing. One of his students, a little girl named Tomeka, is really great at math—nearly genius level, according to Bradley—and she wants to be a software engineer when she grows up.”
“Yes,” Samiah said.
“I haven’t asked you yet.”
“You’re going to ask if she can shadow me at work, and the answer is absolutely yes.”
Samiah could practically hear her sister’s relieved smile through the phone.
“Thank you so much, honey. I just know it would be so powerful for her to see someone who looks like her working in technology. Not just working in it, but killing it.”
The pride blossoming in her heart was so overwhelming Samiah feared it might burst. To hear her big sister, the woman she’d looked up to her entire life, describe her in that way had a greater impact on her than any praise from the powers that be at Trendsetters could ever have.
“However, there is a slight issue,” Denise tacked on, the hesitancy in her voice causing Samiah’s oh, shit antennae to perk up.
“Job Shadow Day is tomorrow, and Tomeka’s parents share a car, and her dad works all the way in Kyle. So she needs someone to pick her up and bring her back to school. I would do it, but you know what the doctor said about me driving.”
“No,” Samiah said. “You’re not driving.”
The million and one things cluttering her desk demanded that she make an excuse for why she couldn’t do this, but she ignored it. She would get it done, even if she had to stay at the office until midnight. This was too important.
“I’ll handle it,” Samiah said.
“Awesome. Bradley will make sure you’re placed on the authorized pick-up list,” Denise said. “Tomeka will be so excited. Do you have any idea how much this will mean to that little girl?”
As a matter of fact, she did. She’d been that little girl. She’d been an eighth grader who’d excelled at math and science and loved learning how things worked. But instead of encouragement, many of her teachers had sought to impede her dreams of entering the tech field. How often had she been berated for thinking too highly of herself, of not being realistic in her aspirations? What a difference it would have made if she’d had a peek into what life could be like for her as a young black woman working with computers day in and day out.
No one should have their dreams discouraged the way hers had been. If not for her stubbornness, and an overpowering desire to prove wrong anyone who’d tried to discount her abilities, she likely would have allowed them to sway her. How many other young women of color saw their dreams succumb to a similar fate?
Not on her watch. Not anymore.
“Just give me the details on when and where to pick her up and I’ll be there,” Samiah said. “I’ll make sure Trendsetters lays out the red carpet for her.”
“Thank you again, hon. Love you,” her sister said.
“Love you too.” She ended the call with Denise and saw a text had come through from Taylor. She’d written one word in all caps: EMERGENCY.
Samiah’s stomach dropped as she immediately hit the call button.
“Hey,” Taylor answered in a hushed voice.
“What’s going on?” Samiah whispered. “Where are you? Are you okay? Have you been kidnapped?”
“Kidnapped?” Taylor asked, her voice now at a normal level.
Samiah sat up straight. “Hold on. Why were you whispering a second ago?”
“Because the lady next to me in line is all in my business,” Taylor said. “I know you were listening to my last phone call,” Samiah heard her say somewhat distantly, as if she’d pulled the phone away from her mouth. A second later, she said, “So, what’s up?”
“You tell me what’s up,” Samiah said. “You just texted emergency in all caps.”
“Oh, yeah, that. So, I have a meeting with this woman in Bee Cave today,” she said, referring to a suburb just west of Austin. “She’s in charge of some kind of homeschooling consortium type thing. I think it’s just a bunch of rich parents who pooled their money to start their own school because they don’t want their kids attending public school. Anyway, she wants to hire me to teach phys ed three days a week.”
Samiah brought a hand up to her head and rubbed her temple. “Is that what you call an emergency?”
“Well, she needs to know by this afternoon,” Taylor said. “The problem is, I’m not sure I want to commit to something like that. But if I don’t take the job, she has someone else she’s going to offer it to.” Her dramatic sigh had Samiah rolling her eyes.
“I don’t know what to do,” Taylor continued. “What if I accept her offer and I don’t like it? And it will definitely eat into the time I’ve set aside for my boyfriend project. I have less than six months to get my shit together before I find Mr. Perfect.”
Was this what it was like to have a little sister? Had she put Denise through this over the years?
“So, do you have any advice?” Taylor asked. “I didn’t want to bother London, but I really needed to talk this through with someone I can trust.”
“Oh, so it was okay to bother me at work, but not London?”
“Well, you’re not literally saving the lives of sick children.”
She had a point.
Retrieving the steno pad from where she’d set it on the bench, Samiah flipped to a fresh page. “Let’s come up with a pros and cons list. It’s always the first place I start. Think about what you would be giving up if you took this job, then list the pros and cons and decide if it’s worth it.”
“Is it really that simple?”
“Sometimes,” Samiah answered. “Don’t make it any harder than it has to be.”
“You’re right,” she said, her relief evident in her voice. “And to think I almost emailed my older brother to ask his advice on this. That would have been a disaster.”
“How so?”
“You don’t want to know the details. Just trust me, it would have ended in me smashing my phone on the ground. Thank goodness I now have actual friends I can bounce ideas off of,” she said. “Okay, I’ll talk to you later. I’ve got a pros and cons list to write up.”
“Good luck,” Samiah said before ending the call.
Considering how close she’d come to ghosting them, Samiah couldn’t get over just how much she’d come to appreciate her new sisters-in-arms. It begged a question she hadn’t thought to ask, but one she couldn’t help but contemplate based on what happened yesterday. With Taylor and London in her life, did she even need Daniel Collins’s friendship?
Their morning coffee ritual had come at a time when her ego and heart needed a boost, but what had once been a pleasant diversion had become a distraction she couldn’t afford. Case in point, the twenty minutes of her lunch break she’d spent thinking about him instead of working on her app. She was falling into the same trap she’d gotten caught in before.
His rejection yesterday hurt, but she was slowly coming to realize that it was for the best. Her focus should be on her goals. She would make sure it was from here on out.