AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Telengard looked pleased with himself. “Hope you got that on tape,” he said loudly, leaning slightly in the phone’s direction. “Physical threats. Possible kidnapping. Keeping me here, when I clearly want to—”
Just then, Adrian’s friend returned. He handed him the coat, as well as a set of car keys.
“It’s clean,” the man muttered. “Front, back, trunk… there’s nothing in it.”
Adrian nodded, and the man left again. When Telengard reached out to snatch his coat back, he didn’t stop him.
“Did you really think I’d be dumb enough to be driving around with it?” he swore, his voice going so low I could barely hear it. Telengard shook his head in disappointment. “C’mon Harper. You’re smarter than that.”
I found myself staring at him, wondering when it all went south. Did he always plan on this? Or had he realized at some point along the line that I had something special, something marketable, something he could actually make money on?
“And I thought you were the real deal,” I replied, my voice full of my own brand of disappointment. “But it turns out you’re just code-savvy. You’re a gifted programmer, I’ll give you that, but these days gifted programmers are a dime a dozen. You have no vision, no creativity, no drive. No ambition to breathe life into or follow through on your own ideas, because you have no ideas of your own.”
If my words were getting through to him, I couldn’t tell. Telengard was sitting calmly, enduring my rant. I gave him a tiny bit of credit for still holding my gaze; for actually facing me instead of looking away this time. But not much.
“How pathetic does it make you feel?” I asked rhetorically. “To be so lame and uninspired, that you have to stoop to stealing the ideas of others?”
Telengard yawned. Gathering his coat in his lap, he looked back at the front door. “Are you done?”
Adrian and Jax leaned in menacingly. At this point they were even angrier than I was. They looked ready to break him in half.
“You’re nothing more than a grifter,” I told him. “And not even a smart one at that.”
“Smart enough, apparently,” he smirked. “Wasn’t I?”
He settled back in his chair, looking more comfortable than he really should. Jax, unable to help himself, grunted threateningly. Beneath the table, I dropped a restraining hand on his knee.
“Can I give you a bit of advice, Harper?” Telengard asked abruptly.
I leaned forward, my eyes burning fiercely into his. Somewhere through my haze of disgust, I eventually nodded.
“In life, you’re either the hammer or the anvil,” he said. “This time around, I’m the hammer. You’re the anvil. That’s just how it played out.”
His smug sense of self-righteousness was overwhelming. I could tell this stream of utter bullshit was ingrained in him. He’d bought into it long ago.
“Don’t hate me for it,” Telengard shrugged, nonchalantly. “I didn’t make the rules, I only follow them. But you should take this loss as a learning opportunity,” he went on. “Next time, you be the hammer. And don’t let yourself be the anvil, ever again.”
His smile reminded me of the Grinch’s, now. It grew wider and wider until it was interrupted by the distinct chime of a smartphone.
Adrian reached out, picked up his phone, and glanced at the screen. Then he looked at us and nodded.
“It’s done.”
My heart soared, as relief flooded through me! My whole body felt electrically charged, as my skin broke out in goosebumps.
Adrian’s boyish grin was so handsome, I wanted to kiss him all over his face. On the other side of me, Jax released our guest’s arm with a smirk of his own.
“W—What’s done?” Telengard stumbled, rubbing his wrist.
I shrugged and looked back at him. “You.”
He glanced back at Adrian’s phone again. To my surprise, he slid it across the table to him.
“Here.”
Telengard’s expression changed from impassivity to horror as he looked into the screen.
“Go on,” said Adrian. “Scroll left.”
