PEYOTE

IT HAD BEEN FOUR days since we visited Jason Culver, and Cal hadn’t answered any of my calls. I looked for her in the office but always missed her by a nanosecond: I would catch sight of the sleeve of her sweater around the corner, detect the scent of her soap. But nothing more.

It wasn’t that I missed her, I thought as I watched the door before KQ’s team meeting. Cal was my business partner, my coworker. We had a joint project that needed finishing; that was all. Mutual interests. When she finally walked in at the last minute, I almost waved, before I saw who was behind her, and had her in such stitches.

“Okay, buttwipes, focus up,” KQ bellowed before falling back into her chair. “Who has good news for me?”

I looked at Cal and Trey, neither of whom looked back at me.

I put my hand up.

“We have something, boss,” I said, nodding at Cal. She looked at me like I had just asked her to prom somewhere loud and public and she was about to say no.

“Great, let’s hear it,” KQ said, her feet on her desk, humorless guard dogs.

I cleared my throat. “Well, as you know, Calamity and I landed a fifteen-person deal. We’re in the process of completing it right now.”

Trey’s laugh was the first sound. I shot him a glance.

“Trey is helping too.”

“Helping?” Trey asked, his hand on his heart.

“It’s a good deal. One guy on behalf of fourteen others—”

I looked at Cal again, but she kept her eyes still. She was nailing the innocent-wallflower vibe. “With Trey’s memory clearance, we’ve found him. All we have to do is retrieve what they want from him, and then they are all ours.”

KQ nodded, one hand on her chin.

“Interesting,” she said.

“It’s really a big credit to Cal; she orchestrated it.”

“That’s not what I find interesting, Peyote.”

I flinched at my full name.

“What is interesting, then?”

“Pey, maybe we should talk privately—” Cal started.

I am not proud of the excitement I felt when I first heard her say my name. But then I recognized her tone.

“What?” I asked stupidly.

“To answer your question, Peyote,” KQ said, stretching her hands up and over her head until her belly button yawned, “I think it’s interesting how you’d glom onto Cal and Trey’s deal with such brass. I’ll admit, when you came into my office the other day, I believed it was you who had come up with this. But now that I know what was really going on—shame on you. And trying to drag this poor girl down with you—we’re all lucky Trey had the decency to put a stop to that.”

“What?” I said again; and again, it was stupid.