Page 107 of Skins Game

Everyone looked up, worried eyes meeting through plexiglass visors or goggles before reaching for their devices.

Nicole’s phone screen opened to her glove-thumbed passcode, and a new email at the top of her inbox from [email protected].

The subject line read,October Layoffs.

Way to break it gently, buddy.Could that silent investor be any more callous? No wonder no one spoke his name.

As she read the email about the impending second wave of layoffs at Sidewinder, her trembling turned to anger.

Twenty-five percent cuts this time, which meant two or threemoreof her people would be gone.

More pings chimed through the lab.

No more emails showed in Nicole’s inbox. “Who got the second email?” Nicole asked the room.

“I did,” Selma said, dark eyes narrowed behind her round glasses and visor.

“Who else?”

Arvind raised his eyes from his phone. “Me.”

Bobert, the guy who calibrated all their equipment so that it worked, raised a blue-gloved hand.

This was insane. These cuts would make it impossible to do her job.

Last Chance was cutting off the feet and wings of the goose that laid the golden eggs.

“We’re not taking this lying down,” Nicole said.

The white-clad people turned toward her, facing her with their visors and safety glasses surrounded by their clean suits.

“Lab work is canceled for today,” she announced. “I have the boxes of cards in my office. Only eighty-five people are left in this company, and the Last Chance management is offsite. We can walk around the offices and do this out in the open.”

The lab techs were swiveling to look at each other, to gauge the reaction of the herd for flight or fight.

“The whole sales team is at the big golf show in New York,” Selma said.

“Meghan and Morgan can join when they get back. Ben was wobbly anyway.”

And Kingston Moore could take a long walk off a short roof of a New York skyscraper for all she cared.

Really.

“We only need thirty percent of the eight-five employees to sign to be recognized, which is twenty-six people,” Nicole said.“The more we get, the better it looks, though. Let’s degarb and get those signatures.Let’s go.”

After they’d all stripped off their rustling paper over-suits in the changing room and the others had marched off to her office to get the cards, Arvind whispered to her, “I was worried today might be your last day.”

“Those venture capitalist jerks can’t laymeoff,” she said. “I would never answer another question about the dev projects, and then they’d be screwed.”

“I was worried you were going to resign because of—you came back early from your—paid time off.”

Yeah, Arvind was sharp. “Yeah, well, maybe that would have happened, but not now. I’m going to stayright the hell hereandfightthese jerks.”

“Ooo,” Arvind said. “You said hell.”

“Yeah.” Nicole grinned at him as she fluffed her hood-flattened hair and re-slicked it back into a ponytail. “Idid.”

Arvind glanced at his phone again. He was degarbed, so Nicole could see a quizzical frown dip his eyebrows. “That’s strange.”