Chapter Sixty-Nine
“Okay, listen.” Ember wheeled toward her, lowering her voice. “If you think I’m not all about figuring out how to stop the bastards who sent those spy-beetle things after me, you’re nuts.”
“He’s just laughing it off.”
“And you need to cool it.” Ember leaned forward and tried to peer around the corner. The sound of fingers typing on light-resistance laptop keys came from the other side of the weird wall dividing the living room from the rest of Matthew’s apartment. “He’s way more interested in figuring out how you got past his defenses.”
“His defenses?”
The fae rolled her eyes. “Or whatever stupid hacker lingo you guys use. I seriously don’t think Matthew has a clue about what’s going on, at least not about who his clients are.” Ember nodded at the metal sphere on the couch.
“Or maybe he’s just a good liar.”
“Yeah, okay. Maybe. But instead of jumping from talking around this whole thing in infuriatingly vague terms to threatening him with physical violence, it might be a good idea to cross some middle ground first.”
Cheyenne met her friend’s gaze and pursed her lips. “Now who’s being infuriatingly vague?”
Ember groaned in frustration. “Seriously, for how smart you are, you can be ridiculously thickheaded sometimes.”
“Sure. You try rolling around in my head for a day.”
“I’ll take a hard pass on that, Cheyenne.” Ember lowered her voice even more and cocked her head. “We haven’t brought up anything about where that war machine is from. Nothing about magicals, the portals, the other side, any of it.”
The halfling narrowed her eyes and looked toward the kitchen, half-expecting to find Matthew spying on them from around the corner. “You think he knows about all that?”
“Hey, I’m taking your opinion into account here. If he knows everything about his companies and what they’re up to, he’d know about that part too, right?”
Cheyenne rubbed her mouth. “Probably. He’s all over trying to fix the hole in his security he’s not gonna be able to find. If he’s that involved in what Combined Reality, Inc. does, he’d at least know about the tech he’s writing programs for.”
“Finally.” Ember glanced at the ceiling.
“Hey, I would’ve come to this conclusion on my own…eventually.”
“Yeah, only after you realized hitting him with deadly magic wasn’t gonna get you anywhere.” The fae shook her brown hair out of her eyes and gripped the armrests of her chair. “We’ll bring that up too. Mention something about magicals or technologynot from Earth, right? Then we can gauge his reaction.”
“Before doing what, Em?”
“Before we show him we’re part of that whole world.”
“Are you insane?” Cheyenne hunched her shoulders when she realized how loud she’d said it. “We can’t just show up at our neighbor’s apartment going, ‘Hey, look at us. We’re magicals from another world most people will never know exists. Feel like telling us all your secrets now?’”
“If he’s been doing business with magicals, what’s the big deal?”
“The big deal.” Cheyenne wrinkled her nose. “Shit, Em. You’re making me feel pretty stupid right now because I can’t come up with an answer for that.”
“You’re not stupid, you’re pissed.” Ember shrugged. “Sometimes that makes you stupid, but it’s temporary.”
A surprised laugh burst out of the halfling, and she ran a hand through her hair as she took a deep breath. “Okay, we’ll do this your way.”
“But for real this time, huh? You didn’t stick to that plan.”
Cheyenne headed back to the couch and dropped onto the leather cushion again. “Your way was taking way too long. I’m not a fan of small talk and drooling over homemade lattes.”
“No shit.” Ember followed and parked her wheelchair beside the end of the couch. “So, when he doesn’t start freaking out about magic and different worlds, we’ll show him what’s up with us.”
“Yeah. Sure.”
“I’ll say something about this bracelet, okay?”
Cheyenne shot her a quick frown. “Why?”
“Why? So you know I’m about to take it off.”
“I’m pretty sure I’ll know what you’re doing the minute you do it.”
“You don’t plan anything ahead of time, do you?”
The halfling grinned and folded her arms. “Not to your level of detail.”
Rolling her eyes, Ember sat back in her chair and slowly shook her head. “You should try it sometime. Maybe then you wouldn’t have to use so much of that healing salve.”
“And ruin all the fun? Come on.” When they looked at each other, both girls snorted. “But hey, that’s why I have you, right? To handle all the detailed planning for me.”
“Don’t push it.”
Cheyenne glanced at the ceiling and shrugged. “I mean, you do have a private chauffeur.”
“I can’t believe we’re having this conversation now.” Ember clenched her eyes shut. “Okay. If you can keep the lid on the drow through the rest of this conversation, sure. I’ll plan stuff for you.”
“Deal.”
“I’ll believe it when I see it.”
Thirty seconds later, Matthew reappeared from around the corner, the stack of papers still clutched in his hand as he scratched the back of his head. He stopped in the living room and looked at his guests like he’d forgotten they were there. “Sorry. Do you guys need another minute?”
“Nope.” Ember smiled. “We’re good, thanks. Perfect timing, actually.”
“Mmhmm.” He sat in the loveseat again. “So, now that you’ve blasted through what I thought was an impenetrable virtual wall, you wanna tell me what you’re looking for?”
There it is. Open invitation. “Yeah. How’d you start making deals with O’gúleesh magicals?”
Matthew finally looked up from the printed details of his company’s work and blinked. “The what?”
“Come on. Maybe you haven’t seen anything that looks like that before.” Cheyenne pointed at the metal sphere. “But you don’t let other people handle things for you if you can do it yourself, right?”
“Right.” He bit his lip and frowned.
Ember took a deep breath. “So you know that whatever parts Combined Reality, Inc.’s working with aren’t from here.”
“If you’re talking about foreign materials, then yeah.”
