Page 31 of Skins Game

“Why would Joe putbulletproof glassin an office building?” he gasped.

She rolled backward and sat cross-legged on the floor beside him. “He wasreallyparanoid about industrial espionage. Are you okay? You didn’t break your leg or anything, did you?”

Kingston rolled up to sitting and glared at his leg, then gingerly probed his ankle. “Definitely didn’t break it. Iwentfor that side kick, though,” he grumbled. “I thought I would be a hero and rescue the fair princess from the locked dungeon.”

She chuckled at him. “Okay, hero. Let’s get you up and walking around.”

“I’m fine.” He brushed off her hands and tottered to his feet.

Getting all those long bones stacked vertically must be hard. Nicole wasn’t tiny for a woman, but there was just so much morelengthto every part of Kingston that balancing all those long blocks on top of each other looked unlikely.

But then he was standing up, very tall above where she sat on the floor, and testing his ankle with his weight. “It’s a little gimpy, but it’s fine. My ego may have suffered a mortal blow, though.”

She grinned up at him. “Just goes to show, don’t be a hero, right?”

His eyeroll mocked himself. “Looking at all those Asgardian and Arthurian swords inspired me to stupidity.”

“Many swords and golf clubs have inspired awesome feats of dumb.”

He glared at the front wall. “You think the fire department could get through that glass?”

“No. It’s probably ax-proof, too.”

Kingston’s sharp look held worry in his blue eyes. “What if this building catches on fire? People wouldn’t be able to get out.”

Nicole shook her head and waved her hand. “If the fire alarms go off, all the doors supposedly spring open, even if it’s locked down.”

“Supposedly?”

“That’s what the manual said.”

“I amnotreassured.”

“Right? Seems kind of like the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory.”

Kingston glanced at the ceiling. “Yeah, it does. I was going to suggest setting one of those chairs on fire to activate the fire system and call the fire department.” He gestured toward the blocky blue conversation set on the other side of the glassed-in lobby. “But I don’t think we should risk burning to death in case the manual was wrong.”

“Yep. That manual was sketchy as heck.”

“Oh, that does it. That lockdown systemwillbe disabled tomorrow morning. This isunsafe,and no employee ofmuh—” Here, he coughed. “—ofSidewinder Golfshould be endangered by the damned building.”

Nicole laughed at him. “The new owners are venture capitalists. They don’t care if we live or die. They might even burn down the building for the insurance money. Joe might have even had it scheduled and forgotten about it in the deal.”

He looked around the lobby like he was scanning for arsonists.“What?”

“It’s just a joke. I’m sure they won’t burn it down,” she sort-of lied. Probably notright then,anyway.

“Yeah,” Kingston said, but he was still watching. “Okay, nothing we can do about it tonight. I would offer to order supper in, but I don’t see any way the delivery person could get the food in here. There isn’t even a mail slot in the door for them to shove French fries through one at a time.”

Nicole hadn’t even thought about food. “We can just smash the glass of those vending machines and take anything we want. Really, who’s going to stop us?”

“I like the way you think. As we don’t seem to have a choice in where we are camping out tonight, it seems like we can either pound on the glass of the front wall until our fists are bloody, or we can turn it intoA Night at the Museum.”

She raised an eyebrow at him. “You mean the golf clubs will come to life and attack us?”

“I mean we can eat candy for dinner and then play with golf clubs in the simulators until we get tired, and then we can crash on the couches until the stupid alarm system turns itself off tomorrow morning.”

“The downstairs break room has better candy in their machines than up in our tech room. Let’s start there, but I think there was only one Snickers bar left.”