Page 21 of Paradigm

“Being twenty-three and a guy.”

Eline laughed at that.

“I need to–”

“It’s okay. I get it. It’s work.”

“Get what?” Arlowe asked.

“That you have to go.”

“Oh, I didn’t mean…” She held up her phone. “I just need to text someone back.”

“Oh,” Eline said. “I thought you…”

“No,” Arlowe replied. “Just give me a second.”

She sent Mitchell a text that she would try to call Travis herself in a few minutes and that she’d deal with him later and thanked him for staying to cover. Then, she looked back up and saw Eline watching her.

“You look good, Arlowe,” Eline said with a smile.

Arlowe smiled back and replied, “You do, too.”

“I recognize that shirt, you know?”

“I thought you might.”

“You stole it?”

“No, you gave it to me,” she argued.

“I let you borrow it; there’s a difference.”

“You want it back right now? I can take it off.”

She said that specifically to see Eline’s reaction, which was to look down at her chest and back up into her eyes.

“I think you’d get arrested for taking off your clothes in a public place. This isn’t Amsterdam, you know?”

Arlowe laughed a little just as another text came in, and she sighed when she looked down and read it to herself.

“Well, I do have to go now. The guy just showed up at the office, and he’s apparently drunk or hungover and asking for me. I need to go fire him. Really wish we already had that HR role Vi wants hired.”

“He’s drunk?”

“Maybe. Michell’s text said it was either that or something else that’s at least equally as bad. I’m sorry. I took the day off, but I’m in charge, and–”

“I understand.”

“I really am sorry. I–”

“Arlowe, it’s okay. I manage people, too. I know how it goes.”

“I don’t know what the protocol is here.”

“What do you mean?” Eline said.

Arlowe put her phone back into her pocket and asked, “What do we do now? I have to go, but I don’t want this to be the last time we see each other.”