Page 109

Sandra opens her mouth, but Ethan raises his hand, his eyes still pinned on me. “And your prelim cost analysis, I see nothing for room or infrastructure updates—I assume our internet modems from ten years ago won’t cut it for the younger generation who want fast and free Wi-Fi.”

“Um, I uh…” Sweat beads my back. “We can take that back and…”I should know this. I went through this with the team. Why can’t I remember anything?

Sandra clears her throat. “Sir, based on our initial research, we think—”

“And do we think the Kensington revamp is the proper comp for The Strata? The customer base is very different.”

He fires off more questions—questions I have no answers for—and my face grows hot.

Stop fidgeting, Lexy.

The Deliminator is in his full glory, completed with one lonely sunbeam streaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows, bathing him in an otherworldly light.

The god of war.

I wet my lips, and his gaze darts to the movement. I think about the night that shall not be remembered. The rasp of his voice. The gentleness in his touch. The way we moved as one, even with all our clothes on.

I swallow a groan.

Dammit, Lexy. You can’t remember four years of your life, but you can describe down to every mortifying detail what happened between you and Ethan Anderson on the dance floor.

My skin flames and his eyes flare, as if he can read my lurid thoughts.

The palpable tension stretches on—a strange, awkward silence I can almost taste—I shift on my feet.

“Meeting adjourned.” His gaze is inscrutable and a muscle twitches in his jaw. “Ms. Vaughn, can you stay behind?”

Sandra and the others quickly gather their things, a few of them throwing sympathetic glances my way before scurrying out the door.

“You want me to stay with you?”Sandra mouths, her eyes darting between me and Ethan, who looks like he wants to murder his laptop.

“It’s fine. I got this.” I shoo her away.

“You sure?”

“Ms. Hale, don’t you have better places to be?” Ethan’s voice is a whip lashing us. Sandra jolts and hauls ass out of the room.

The door snicks shut.

I gulp, my heart palpitating. I must’ve fucked up the presentation. Why did I even think I could—

“Alexis, did you understand what you just presented?”

His voice was quiet—almost gentle—and I snap my head up, finding him staring at me in his usual unnerving way.

Like he can see through me.

“Just give me another chance. I promise I’ll do more research and be better prepared—”

“That’s not what I asked.” He beckons me over. “Come, sit down.”

I swallow, my breathing thready, and take a seat next to him—well, more like he’s sitting at the head of the table and I’m sitting to the right of him…as far away as I can without appearing I’m avoiding the proximity.

He arches his brow, his lips twitching, but he doesn’t comment on it. “Ryland wanted to improve our internship programs to give interns a better taste of the real world. Decisions to be made. Costs. Pressures. It wasn’t meant to torture you.”

Ethan’s lips form a ghost of a smile and my heart flips.

He continues, “But our interns can’t succeed if they don’t know the basics. The entire program will be meaningless then. So let me ask you again, were you comfortable with what you were presenting?”