Page 12 of The Five Year Lie

“You’re early,” he says as I take my seat.

“You’re observant.”

He stops typing and lifts his messy head. “Is that a joke?”

“Yes, it is.” It doesn’t work to be flip with Zain. He isn’t verygood at taking social cues. “Thank you for helping me yesterday when I spilled coffee everywhere.”

“Welcome,” he mutters, going right back to work.

I boot up my computer and then poise my hands on the keyboard, gathering the courage to look Drew up in the corporate directory. I haven’t done that for years.

But when I typeDrew Millerinto the search bar, the screen comes back blank, withNo results.

My breath catches. Right after he left, when I was so hurt and confused, I used to pull up his employee photo and stare at it, wondering where he’d gone, and whether he’d come back.

But now he’s just gone. Again.

“Zain,” I say quietly. He probably knows everything about how our database works.

“Yes?” He stops typing.

“Before your time, we had an employee named Drew Miller, and—”

“It wasn’t before my time,” he says curtly. “I used to sit over there.” He points to another section of the bullpen. Chime Co. has grown fivefold in the last few years. “His desk was near mine. You just never noticed me until Ray moved me over here.”

“Oh.”Whoops. “Sorry.”

He shrugs. “You weren’t the only one. Drew Miller was friendly, though. Asked a lot of questions. Never hid my favorite coffee cup.”

I sit back. “That’s a thing?”

He shrugs again. Then he leans over to stare at my screen. “They deleted him from the directory?”

“Apparently.” I clear my throat. “We were, um, friends.”

“Friends.”A frozen smirk appears on his face. “Is that what you called it?”

Surprise makes me snappish. “You know what? Never mind.” I push back my chair, preparing to go make myself a cup of coffee.

“Hold up. Sorry,” he says. “I knew it was a secret.”

I glance around, but we’re still alone. “What do you mean youknew?”

“I used to see you two on the weekends at the Holy Donut.”

That was one of our favorite spots.

“... But you ignored each other at work. Like, completely.”

This is also true. We never made eye contact in this room. Because people talk, and the office is full of cameras. “Yeah, my father was...”

“... A dickweed?” Zain suggests. “No kidding. And I don’t judge, Ariel. I just liked knowing a secret that nobody else knew.”

I blow out a panicky breath, wondering if Zain could be toying with me. Becausesomeoneis. That text didn’t drop out of the sky.

Was this his idea of a sick joke?

“What happened to Drew, anyway?” Zain asks. “He just disappeared.”