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Olivia swung her feet to the side and jumped to the ground, relieved none of the weakness from last night remained. After a lukewarm shower, because she hated cold ones, and dressing for the day, she went directly to her laptop and phone in the now clean and organized living room, pointedly avoiding the vase of sunflowers on the coffee table.

It’d been there last night when she’d returned, but she had disregarded it then as well, not ready to deal with whatever it meant.

Thankfully, her laptop and phone both survived yesterday’s magical explosion. Three missed calls from Yun, her boss, twenty emails, five of which were also from Yun, the rest junk.

An ache spread from her chest outwards. She’d been gone for five days and the only one who’d noticed was her boss. Though she’d purposely made the choice not to let anyone get too close, it still hurt, to realize she mattered to no one.

Yun’s messages ran along the lines of “Where are you? I heard what happened at the lab. Call me.”

It wasn’t like she and Yun were close. Olivia wasn’t the kind who made friends easily. After her parents’ deaths, she’d been too busy for a social life, working two jobs to keep a roof over her and Betsy’s heads. Once Betsy reached eighteen and went to college, Olivia had done the same, but she’d been older than her fellow students. She’d tried to fit in, but after raising Betsy, she’d felt more like the students’ parent than their friend. In the end, she’d devoted herself to her studies. Even after she received her PhD and began working, she kept others at arms’ length, rarely going out to eat or happy hour.

But you didn’t need to be best friends with someone to worry about their safety after a break-in. If their situation had been switched, Olivia would want to check in with Yun as well.

Before she could dial Yun, her laptop rang with the sound of an incoming video-call. Yun must have seen she was online. Perfect timing. Her boss was in his late fifties, with white strands beginning to show in his short, black hair. Dressed in his white lab coat, he looked both concerned and relieved when Olivia answered.

“Olivia, are you all right?” he asked and looked left and right, clearly checking out Olivia’s background. “Where’re you? I went by your place, but no one was there.”

“I’m fine. Thanks for checking,” Olivia said as guilt squirmed in her stomach. “I’m in Vegas.”

“Vegas? Wait, weren’t you going to LA to visit your sister?”

Olivia had informed him when she’d requested the week off. “Yeah, I did.” She sighed. “It’s a long story.”

“Vegas…” Yun said, his face pale. “Are you with vampires? Do you need help?” The last sentence was whispered as if people were eavesdropping.

“No, no, everything’s okay. I’d rather not get into it.”

“Fine. When are you coming back? We need you at the lab.”

She pursed her lips. She hadn’t planned that far yet. Yun had only given her a week off. But after what Marek had told her, she couldn’t return to Zylotech. Did Yun know anything? Unlikely. Yun didn’t have access to the right wing.

“I still need to take care of a few things,” she said, hedging.

A strange expression flashed and then disappeared instantly from Yun, so fast she thought she’d imagined it. “You can’t come back earlier? Your samples are ready and can’t wait. Gary’s been asking to assess them.”

Of course Gary would, Olivia almost snapped and had to take a deep breath to reign in her temper. Gary had started six months ago. At first, he’d tried to charm her and discuss their research, even asking her out for coffee and lunch. Too bad he wasn’t the first one to play this trick on her. Jacob had taught her a hard lesson, an important one that still hurt.

When Gary’s charisma failed, he’d begun to hover over her shoulder even though his research focused on a different aspect than hers. One morning, she’d come in early and caught him snooping around her desk.

As if she’d be stupid enough to leave him anything to find.

“He’s welcome to them.” Olivia smiled sweetly. “He can send me the write-up and I can review it later. I’ll even take him out to dinner to thank him later.”And maybe I’ll bring Marek. I bet Gary would love that.She turned away from the screen so Yun couldn’t see her vicious grin.

“You know we can’t email confidential research information.”

“I have the company’s VPN. Isn’t that enough?”

“But you’re in Vegas. Who knows what the vampires are monitoring? You know some of them don’t like what we do.”

Olivia frowned. It wasn’t like Yun to be discriminatory toward vampires. Last month, he’d told her he planned to visit Vegas later this year.

“Fine. Then it can wait until I’m back,” she lied. No point in telling Yun about her nebulous plans.

Yun didn’t look pleased with her answer. “You know how important your research is to Zylotech. Your contract renewal is coming up. It would go a long way for the renewal decision to cut your vacation short and show a little initiative.”

Olivia crossed her arms. In the year she’d worked for Yun, he’d never acted like this. “Are you threatening me?”

“It’s not a threat.” Yun’s smile had an edge to it. “I’m just saying, think of your career. You wouldn’t want everything you worked so hard for to go down the drain.”