Page 125 of His Good Girl

Benjamin wanted me to stop fucking the new hire.

He had not said it exactly that way, though, which was a mercy neither of us deserved.

Avery was already in my office when I walked in, sitting at the desk that I had paid facilities to assemble and install before anyone sensible could stop me. She wore a charcoal skirt today with a pale blue blouse tucked into it and her hair swept back from her face in a way that made her look composed, clear-eyed, and painfully young until she looked up at me. Then the youth vanished under something more private.Mine, some caveman part of me supplied, and I set my briefcase down before the thought could reach my face.

“Good morning, Mr. Rowe,” she said.

“Good morning, Miss Hale.”

Her eyes heated at the formality, just enough for me to notice.

I sat down and worked while Avery worked a few feet away from me. She took notes on the mayor’s office call with more detail than Marcus, who had been doing this for fifteen years. She cleaned up Dana’s briefing summary without removing the spine of it. She caught a timeline inconsistency in a risk memo that Tom had missed, then immediately looked startled by her own usefulness, as if competence were something that had happened to her by accident instead of something she had been carrying around under fear and bad bosses for years.

I wanted to praise her for it.

I did. Twice.

The first time, she smiled down at her keyboard like she was trying to hide the effect. The second time, she bit her lip and pretended to reach for a pen.

I noticed.

God help me, I noticed everything.

By three, my office had turned into a war room. Benjamin moved in and out with documents, legal updates, coffee, and the expression of a man suffering on behalf of civilization. Dana came in at least five times, once to argue with me, once to argue with Marcus over speakerphone, twice to retrieve Avery for ‘useful work that does not involve Callum’s gravitational field,’ and once to stand in my doorway, look between us, and say nothing at all. Avery survived it with her chin up, but I saw the flush creep along her throat after Dana left.

At five-thirty, the floor began thinning around us. The Hartwell team had moved from panic to siege mode, which was progress. Legal had drafted notices. PR had a statement that did not make me want to throw it through the glass. Marcus was already on the train to the capital, and I was due to follow in a private car at seven that night so I could spend my Saturday morning explaining to people in expensive suits that anonymous insinuation was not evidence, safety was not a campaign slogan, and Lang could go to hell through the proper channels.

Avery was still working.

She had a pen in one hand, a stack of internal summaries beside her, and that particular furrow between her brows that appeared when she was trying to turn nonsense into language people could use. I watched her for longer than I should have. The evening light had gone gold against the glass behind her,catching in the loose strands of her hair and softening the severe line of her blouse. She looked tired. She looked proud. She looked like trouble I had already chosen to engage in and would definitely choose again.

“You’re done,” I said.

She looked up. “I still have two more.”

“They’ll be there Monday.”

“I can finish them.”

“I know. That isn’t what I said.”

Her mouth tightened with what looked like disappointment. It hit me harder than it should have.

“You’re sending me home?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Because of the trip?”

“Because of the trip. Because you’ve worked a full day. Because if I keep you in this office any longer, Benjamin will develop a medical condition purely out of spite.”

Avery smiled, but it was smaller than usual. “And because you need distance?”

I leaned back in my chair.

“No,” I replied. “Because I need to exercise some restraint.”

I should not have said that. It was too honest for the office and too harsh for what had been happening between us.