Page 20 of Instigator

“I don’t think I’ll feel comfortable anywhere,” he admits, rubbing his palms on his jeans. “I—I’m not in crisis. Not yet. But I can feel it creeping closer, and…”

“We’ll get ahead of it,” she says in her soothing therapy voice. “Let’s find some privacy, and we can talk.”

His swallow is loud in the quiet room.

“Just talk. Whatever is on your mind, you’re safe with me. With us.”

Sinclair rises from the couch and starts toward her, then turns back to me. “Thanks, Cap.”

“Anytime.”

And I mean it. I’m here for my teammates. My brothers. We battle together on the ice every day, and we’ll be here for each other as we battle our inner demons too.

His lips tip into a half smile before he gestures to the door, and he and Dr. Liz disappear into the hallway.

I close the door behind them and then flop onto the couch, emotionally drained. Sliding my phone from my pocket, I stare unseeingly at the screen. I want to talk to Annie again, but after the weird way we left things, I don’t know that I’m ready for another charged conversation.

Instead, I pull up the Kindle app on my phone and lose myself in this month’s book club novel. If I can’t tolerate the real world, at least I can escape from reality for a bit.

nine

. . .

Ceci

Bex looks up from her desk when I enter our shared office. “Hey, stranger.”

“Sorry I’ve been MIA.” Reaching my desk, I pull my laptop out of my backpack and plug it into the dock. “The overstimulation got to me.”

I haven’t been to the office in three days, working remotely in the middle of the night when I think best. Insomnia has consumed me ever since Wish hung up on me, and I can’t stop thinking about it. The fluorescent office lights were overwhelming, and the idea of putting on a bra and makeup made me want to curl up in a blanket burrito and never leave my house again.

I don’t feel like myself when I’m not wearing makeup. It’s my armor. After years of throwing my hair into a messy ponytail and swiping on mascara and lip balm before losing myself in my computer, it feels surprisingly grounding to blow out my hair, apply a full face of makeup, and dress like the Bad Boss Bitch I want to be. That I am.

“Hey, it happens,” Bex says, shuffling some papers on her desk. “You’re doing better?”

“Much.”

“Good. I’m glad.”

“Oh, and I think I figured out what was wrong with the code. It came to me in a dream.” I woke up from a dead sleep, picked up my computer from the other side of the bed, and worked for two hours before passing out again.

“Whatever works.” She doesn’t care about the details behind the sensor’s mechanism that conveys the impact, or how it evaluates severity, only that it does. “Are we ready for human testing?”

For the last six months, we’ve only been using crash-test dummies as we tweak our approach. I’m confident that with this latest tweak in the code, we’re on the right track.

“I want to quadruple-check everything, but I think so, yeah.” My dual monitors flicker to life, along with my inbox. Fifty-seven unread emails pop up, and I immediately close out of my email client. “I need to write up a progress report for Heidi. Our next board meeting is a few weeks away, and she’s champing at the bit for updates.”

Bex grimaces. “Better you than me.”

“Thanks, babe.”

My sarcasm doesn’t bother her, though. She rolls her eyes and refocuses on her computer, so I do the same. After a few minutes, she turns on our favorite playlist, and we work to the upbeat pop music, sometimes singing along.

I’m in the zone. Nothing will distract me. Nothing will bring me down.

Until a knock raps on the open office door, and I glance up to see four hours have gone by. My eyes are dry from staring at the screens for so long, and my bladder protests, and oh yeah, I guess I’m hungry too.

Nick Mitchell, Bex’s fiancé, stands in front of her desk, a canvas tote bag slung over his shoulder. He’s wearing dark gray joggers and a hoodie, a backwards Boston Bulldogs cap on his head.