Total pages in book: 47
Estimated words: 44703 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 224(@200wpm)___ 179(@250wpm)___ 149(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 44703 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 224(@200wpm)___ 179(@250wpm)___ 149(@300wpm)
She listens to the polymer part with the same enthusiastic confusion she brings to all my work stories. “That sounds very important, honey. Is the poly...morphine...thing working?”
“Polymer. And yes, I think so. Early results are promising.”
“I’m so proud of you.”
She says this every call. Every single one. And every single time, I have to swallow past the lump in my throat because Joni Morgan says “I’m proud of you” the way other people say “the sky is blue,” like it’s a simple, obvious fact that she can’t imagine anyone questioning.
“Thanks, Mom.”
“And the people at work? Everyone’s treating you well?”
I think of the laughter in the hallway. The conversations that stop. The word human spoken like a diagnosis.
“Everyone’s great,” I say.
“And you’re eating enough?”
“Yes, Mom.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
We say goodnight, and I love you, and I hang up and sit on the edge of my bed in the quiet of my apartment.
The books on the windowsill catch the lamplight, their cracked spines a little rainbow of someone else’s love stories.
I pick up the one on top, a paperback I’ve already read twice, about a girl who falls for someone impossible and somehow it works out anyway, and I hold it against my chest for a moment before opening it.
It’s fiction.
But it’s a nice fiction.
And right now, that’s enough.
MONDAY MORNING.
I’m early again, because I’m always early, because being early is one of the few things in life I can control. The design wing is empty except for me and the cleaning crew, who wave at me as I pass because we’re on a first-name basis at this point. I know that Carla has a daughter in middle school and that Joram is saving up for a trip home to the Philippines and that Bea makes the best empanadas in the western hemisphere and brings them in on Fridays.
I wave back, settle at my desk, and open my computer.
There’s an email at the top of my inbox.
From Human Resources.
Subject: Meeting Request — Immediate Attention Required.
My stomach drops.
I read the email twice. Then a third time, because the words keep rearranging themselves in my head into configurations that all point to the same conclusion.
I’m being called to a meeting. Today. At 10 a.m.
The location is not Human Resources.
The location is the executive floor.
And the name on the meeting request, the person who apparently wants to see me at ten o’clock on a Monday morning for reasons that are not specified and that I can.t begin to imagine—
Is Prince Alexei Lykaios.
I stare at the screen.
And then I do what any rational, professional, emotionally stable adult would do in this situation.
I text Trish.
Me: I think I’m about to be fired by the Prince of Atlantis.
Her response is immediate.
Trish: WHAT
Trish: WHAT
Trish: WHAT???
Yeah.
That about sums it up.
CHAPTER TWO
“THE CONVERGENCE EXPO is held annually at The Hive in Miami. The Hive is House Bellecourt’s headquarters, fifty floors, downtown, and the Bellecourts are—”
“Caros,” I say. “Old bloods. Four brothers. Anti-vampire technology leaders.”
Ruby gives me a look that might be approval. It’s hard to tell with Ruby. Her face operates within a very narrow emotional bandwidth, somewhere between “brisk efficiency” and “slightly less brisk efficiency.”
“Good. Now, His Highness will handle all primary interactions. You don’t speak unless he directs a question to you. You take notes on this.” She hands me a tablet. “All feedback, inquiries, and follow-up items go into the shared file labeled Convergence 2026. You don’t deviate from the file structure. You don’t create new folders. You don’t rename anything.”
I nod. I’m nodding so much I probably look like one of those bobblehead figures people put on their dashboards.
“You address him as Your Highness. Not sir. Not Prince Alexei. Not—” She pauses, as if considering the full range of things a nervous twenty-two-year-old human might accidentally call the Prince of Atlantis. “Anything else.”
“Your Highness. Got it.”
“When walking, you remain one step behind and to his left. If he stops, you stop. If he gestures for you to speak, you speak clearly and concisely about the product specifications and nothing else. Don’t volunteer personal opinions. Don’t make small talk with delegates. Don’t—”
She’s still going. There are more rules. So many more rules. Ruby is delivering them at a speed that suggests she normally briefs people who can absorb information at preternatural rates, which I can’t, because I’m a human person with a human brain that is currently devoting approximately sixty percent of its processing power to the single thought: How in the world did I end up here?
Because twenty-four hours ago, I was eating onigiri at my desk and redesigning polymer casings. That’s my life. That’s what I’m good at. I’m good at quiet, focused, detail-oriented work that nobody notices until it saves someone’s life in a vampire attack, and I’m very much not good at whatever this is, this Secretary Kim situation where I’m supposed to glide around in heels and anticipate the needs of the world’s most famous preter royal.