Nash rose and wiped his hands on a cloth. “Morning, boss. Our customers here yet?”
“Good morning, Nash. No, they’re coming after lunch.” She pointed her thumb at Joey. “Putting this guy to work?”
“You know it.”
Stefanie looked at Joey. “You regret volunteering to work here yet?”
“Not a bit.” Joey grinned. “Is Cole stopping by again today?”
That was their signal. Stefanie gave the pre-planned response that indicated no one had done anything suspicious yet. “No, he’s out of the office.” Stefanie raised an eyebrow. “Are you two trying to get rid of me already?”
Nash put his hands in the air. “No way. If you’re gone, I report to Cole. And he is way too busy flying all over the place to deal with me.” He leaned forward. “Plus, and you didn’t hear it from me, Cole has no business turning a wrench in my lab.”
Joey tightened one last bolt and placed the wrench on the workbench. “Ouch. Let me know if he says that about me when I’m not in the room.”
“Not likely. At least you’re actually helpful. Cole asked me if he could look at a transmitter well over a month ago and he still hasn’t brought it back.” Nash shook his head. “It’s not like I can ask my boss’s boss if he’s done pretending he understands what we do.”
Stefanie smiled a tight smile as her heart began to pound. It was the transmitter. Cole said it had been found on the ship, not that he’d borrowed it from the lab. She hadn’t been imagining the additional signal on her first trip out. But why did Cole lie to her? Behind Nash’s back, Joey raised his eyebrows. Good. He noticed her alarm. Finally realizing she’d paused for a non-normal period of time, she crossed her arms. “What have I told you about not scaring the new people?”
“I shouldn’t scare the new people.” Nash hung his head in mock sincerity. “But Joey doesn’t scare easily, do you, Joe?”
The question sucked the breath right out of Stefanie’s lungs, but Joey didn’t seem to notice. “Not that easily. Hey, Peggy said something about you bringing a dog in today?”
“Oh yeah, that.” Stefanie managed to project some light annoyance. “Well, apparently the Board of Directors hired some consultants who told us we need to be making more of an effort to appear like a rising company and find new, innovative ways to attract top talent. And snap a few pictures for the website.”
Nash scrunched up his nose. “Ew. We paid someone to tell us that? Joey here is willing to work for free. We must be doing something right. Although I’m not going to complain about a dog in the office. I love dogs.”
“Well, Joey is getting paid, we’re just not the ones writing the check.” Stefanie gave him a half-smile. “Anyway, I have a friend in the area who is trying out this rent-a-dog program. You know how some companies have pets? Basically, she’s offering a service where you can dog-share for a few days a week and pay for the privilege.”
“And we spent our lab budget on borrowing a dog?” Nash rubbed the back of his neck.
Stefanie raised her hands defensively. “Nope. She’s doing it purely to get her name out there. A doggy billboard, if you will. Bad news is that I committed to her before we found out we’d have customers. Can you guys keep an eye on the dog if I need your help? I’m assuming they’re sending some kind of purse-sized dog. It has to be a breed that travels easily.” Stefanie deliberately misstated Waffle’s information. She didn’t need to look like she’d rehearsed the story countless times with Alexis.
Nash and Joey exchanged a look. If Stefanie didn’t know better, she might not have known he was in on it. Joey shrugged. “Will fur hurt your parts?”
Nash scanned the room. “Should be okay today. As long as he isn’t radioactive.” Nash held up one of the lab’s Geiger counters, used to monitor water near nuclear plants. “I just finished the bracket on this one, so it can be snapped in whenever a customer wants it. In fact, everything I have on our demo platform should be streaming data to your phone.” Nash snapped the Geiger counter into the nearly complete platform with a flourish.
Stefanie checked the custom app. None of the readings were particularly informative, since the sensors just sitting on a table, but the data was updating automatically as if she were streaming it from one of their buoys. Soon, the readout from the Geiger counter appeared on the app, showing tiny levels of background radiation. “Nice. That is an excellent proof of concept.”
“You can use it to impress our newest clients. All sensors should be reading out to your phone now. You can show them as much or as little as you’d like.”
Once Stefanie left the room, Nash eyed Joey curiously. Joey kept his head down. He’d been working to conceal his increasing comfort with Stefanie, but maybe he hadn’t done as much as he should have. Nash nodded at the place she’d just been standing. “I wouldn’t go there. At least until this thing wraps up.”
Joey stilled. Was he talking about the internship or something else? “I think you’ve got me all wrong.”
Nash put away a small wrench he’d been using, taking his time to reply. “I don’t usually get people wrong. There’s something going on, even if it’s one-sided. We look out for each other here.”
Joey tensed. Was Nash in on all of this? Joey shrugged and threw out a red herring. “I’m…interested. But I’m not dumb enough to act on it until this internship is over. Then, well, who knows? I don’t want to mess up an opportunity to work here later, either. It’s so hard to get your foot in the door until you have experience.”
“Yeah, that’s true. I started
