Outside the Lines (Rebel Hearts #1) (5 page)

*

“You should dress up like this more often,” Cameron says, scrolling through Facebook. “You’re hot.”
 

I look up from the computer and make a face. “Would you pay me more if I dressed up?”

He raises his eyebrows. “No, but I—”

“Then it’s not worth it.” I quickly type out a code, press enter, then save my progress. “What do you think?” I ask and push my feet against the floor, causing my rolling chair to scoot away from the desk. I yawn and grab my coffee at the last minute, before I’m too far to reach it. It’s Monday morning. I need all the coffee I can get today. Cameron leans in, clicking through the website.
 

“It looks great! Way better than what the client paid for,” he only half jokes. “Seriously. You’re good, Lissy.”
 

“Thanks. And really, it was easy.”
 

“I don’t know why you’re here,” he says quietly. “As much as I don’t want to lose you, I feel like you’re wasting your talents here.”
 

I shrug off the compliment. “When the CIA seeks me out to be part of a top-secret hacker group, I’ll quit.”
 

Cameron rolls his eyes. “Why don’t you apply? You don’t have to be kidnapped in a black windowless van to get a job with the government, you know.”
 

“I do,” I say. “And I’ve looked into it. I’ll think about it.” I’ve opened the online application many times. Not just the CIA either. The FBI or Homeland Security would work too. And I’m sure there were other even more secret groups out there too. I wouldn’t exactly be Black Widow, but fighting cybercrime would be badass enough for me.
 

“So,” I say with a sigh. “Do I have to go to that appointment now?”

Cameron checks the time. “You got some time. What do you want for lunch? Thai food?”

I smile. “Aww, you know me so well.”
 

“More than I wish I did,” he shoots back. “Your usual?”

I nod and log onto my company email to message the art director about the garden website. Assuming he approves the graphics I added this morning, I’m done. I grab my phone and scroll through Pinterest, pinning fan-made memes of my favorite shows until Cameron texts me to tell me lunch is here.
 

No one really cares that I’m friends with the boss, but Cam worries about his boss coming down hard on him for being so casual with me. There are no official policies against it, but it’s “frowned upon” by the guys upstairs. Whatever. Buying me lunch as a thank you is harmless, if you ask me. I sit in the breakroom, half paying to the Steve Wilkos show as I eat my spicy noodles until I have to go.
 

I tell the people at On Star the address and get directions sent over, then drive halfway across town to a fancy art gallery, owned by a Mr. Hartford. I park and pull down the mirror, running my hands through my hair, which had gotten messy from the wind blowing through the open windows.
 

A little bit of dread goes through me when I get out of the car. I take a breath, finding my resolve, and think about Black Widow again. I push my shoulders back and walk into the lobby. Cold air hits me, making goosebumps break out over my arms.
 

I’m standing in a small foyer-ish lobby, with dark wooden floors and what I guess is the original tin-tiled ceiling. The lights are dimmed and weird; abstract art hangs on the walls. There are teeny-tiny handwritten price tags under each painting. My eyebrows hike up and I shake my head. Those things each cost my month’s rent.
 

“Can I help you?” someone asks, and walks out from behind a satin curtain that’s hanging by a desk.
 

“Yeah,” I say and turn. “I’m here to—” I cut off when the familiar face of Mindy fucking Abraham comes into view.
 

Her brows push together. “Felicity?”

Dammit. I can’t lie about who I am now, even though my first thought is to switch to a British accent and call myself Emma.
 

“I’m here to help you with the computer issues you’re having. Customer service and all,” I finish, bypassing her question again.

She blinks a few times. “Right, right.” She smiles pleasantly and turns, waving me to follow her. Her blonde hair is pulled up into a perfect French twist, not a strand out of place, and her pencil skirt is the perfect combination of tight and work-appropriate, as well as the gray satin blouse she has on. There isn’t a single run in her panty-hose, and her tall black heels click on the floor.
 

I shake myself, digging my nails into my palms. I’m not standing in the high school cafeteria, cheeks burning from the heat of embarrassment as she points and laughs at how my Spiderman lunch box matches the patches of red skin on my arms.
 

I internally grumble and take a step forward.
Fuck you, Cameron, for making me do this.
I close my eyes, inhale, and channel my inner Hermione. She never gave two shits what anyone thought of her and she ended up being even more badass than Harry, even if the books don’t admit it.
 

Mindy scoots a big leather chair out from behind the dark oak desk. There’s a picture of her holding a toddler, smiling up at the camera. Of course she’s married and has the world’s cutest kid.
 

“I thought someone named Marissa was coming out,” she starts and enters her password into the computer.
 

“Yeah, she’s having a baby or something,” I say. “I’m just filling in.”
 

She nods. “Do you remember me? I’m pretty sure we went to high school together.”
 

Of course I remember her. She, along with her popular friends, made my life hell for a few years. I turn and look at her, as if I have to recall her face, as if she hadn’t impacted me as she did.
 

“Mindy,” I say like the name suddenly came to me. “Yeah, I remember you.”
 

She smiles. “Thought so. And I did totally see you at that store the other day.”
 

I keep my eyes on the computer screen, wincing at how outdated everything is. Seriously, Windows XP? I shrug. “Maybe. So, what’s the problem you’ve been having?”

“I think it has a virus,” she says. “We bought some sort of Kasper-something or other but I don’t think it works. Everything is so slow and I can’t get onto the internet without clicking on this a million times.” She points with a manicured nail to the Wi-Fi icon on the screen. “The website you guys made won’t load, and I can’t update it. So you can get rid of the virus and put new protection on then make the site work?”

I laugh. “It’s not that easy, but let me run a few checks and see what’s going on.” I scoot the big chair closer and after a few clicks know one of the problems is the lack of memory and the old systems the gallery is using. It’s not compatible with the website. The server can’t support pretty much anything done in the last five years.
 

“When did you move to Grand Rapids?” Mindy asks. She’s hovering over my shoulder, watching me work. It’s fucking annoying.
 

“About half a year ago,” I say.
 

“I’ve been here for four years,” she says, like I care. “My husband got a job at the hospital here.”
 

I nod, trying not to notice the way she accentuated the word “husband.”
 

“And I’ve been here for a while. I just needed something to do, and Ben is so talented.”
 

“Ben?”

“The artist,” she says. I catch her rolling her eyes. “He owns the gallery.”
 

“Gotcha,” I say.
 

“He has a computer in his office that has the same virus. Same issues. Slow, bad internet connection.”
 

“That doesn’t mean a virus,” I say. “Where’s the router?” When Mindy doesn’t answer, I turn to look at her. Her eyes are wide open.
 

“I don’t know. Shouldn’t you be able to figure that out? You’re the expert here. Maybe in ‘my documents’?”
 

Thank you, Mindy fucking Abraham, for reinforcing the pretty and stupid stereotype.
 

“It’s not in the computer,” I say. “It’s a little box-looking thing. What other computers do you have?”

“There’s this one, and one in Ben’s office.”
 

“I’d guess the router is in there. Is he in there too, by any chance? I can go take a look at it now.”

She looks at me like I just asked for free backstage passes for a sold-out concert. “No. He’s busy, and he doesn’t like to be bothered when he’s busy.”
 

Sounds like a nice guy. “Uh, okay. You don’t have a virus, but your computer is horribly out of date. It can’t support the site, which is why you can’t get it to load.”
 

She puts her hands on her hips. “You can tell that already?”

“I’ll run a full diagnostic test,” I say. “But I promise you that’s the issue.”
 

“Is it going to take long? Because I have stuff to do.”
 

“I’m not sure how long it will take yet. Your computer needs a lot of updates, and the lack of memory is going to make that hard. I’ll see what I can do.”
 

Mindy leans in. “Can you put more memory on it? I have a Google Drive thing.”
 

“That’s not really the same,” I say and feel like I’m talking to my grandma. “It can help if you delete things from your hard drive, but it would have to be a substantial amount.”
 

Mindy straightens and crosses her arms. “So you have no idea how long this will take?”

“No, I don’t,” I reply and remind myself to stay professional. I’m working a job, not catching up with an old high school nemesis. “You’re way overdue for an upgrade. I’ll do that and try the site again. Well, update if I can.” I click through a few more things, growing annoyed and irritated with Mindy hovering. “I’ll let you know when I’m done,” I inform her with a smile.
 

“Okay,” she says and turns, only to return a minute later with another chair. “I need to sit at the desk.”

“Makes sense.”
 

She’s still too close, and I feel her eyes on me, not the computer. “I haven’t seen you since college,” she begins, pausing to see if I’d say anything.
 

“Yeah, it’s been a while.”
 

“I almost didn’t recognize you without that skin issue. It seems to have cleared up.”
 

I freeze. Seriously? I don’t know if I should be embarrassed or pissed. It took a while to find a good combo of creams and meds, but I’d finally gotten the red flakey skin from psoriasis to go away. I’d have to stop taking the medication if I ever got pregnant, but I figure if a man loved me enough to intentionally knock me up, he’ll be okay with the red spots for a while.

Mindy waits a beat for me to answer. When I don’t, she goes one. “What have you been up to?”
 

I know this game. She’s asking me so I’ll have to ask her and she can show off her amazing life. I guess some people never change. You can take the bitch out of high school but you can’t take the bitch out of, well, anyone.
 

“You know, normal stuff,” I tell her.
 

“That’s good. Do you like Grand Rapids? Was it hard to leave your friends?”

I don’t take my eyes off the computer. “Yes, but I have lots of friends here and we hang out all the time,” I lie right through my teeth. Ninety-nine percent of them are online. Okay, fine. Ninety-eight percent since I count Ser Pounce as a friend. Hanging out on forums and talking over games is pretty much the same thing as hanging out in real life though. Who is she to judge?

Calm your tits, Felicity.
 

“Do you still talk to anyone from high school or college?”

“Not really. Just my best friend Erin.”
 

“Erin?” I can see her tip her head. “I don’t remember her.”
 

“Too bad. She’s pretty awesome.”
 

Mindy giggles. “High school was so long ago. And that’s good you’re liking it here. So funny to think we both ended up here!”
 

“Hilarious,” I say dryly. Hilarious in a way that this is proof the universe hates me. I scoot closer to the computer.
 

“Are you married?” Mindy asks. She can clearly see the lack of a wedding ring on my finger.

“Nope.”
 

“Oh. I got married young, a few days after I turned twenty-one. I just couldn’t say no!” She laughs like it’s actually funny. “So you have a boyfriend then?”

“Nope.”
 

“Ah, must be nice to do whatever you want then.”
 

“It is.” I yawn and wish I’d stopped for more coffee. I’d downed my second cup on the way here. Why did Mindy still feel the need to put me down in a passive-aggressive way? Mom would tell me it was some deep psychological issue and she was actually insecure. While I did believe that, I also believed some people were just assholes, and Mindy fit that bill.

The front door opens, and an older couple comes in to buy a painting. Mindy gets up and greets then, then disappears into the gallery.
 

Adios, bitchachos.
 

I work in silence for a while, and figure out pretty fast that the computer is loaded with cookies. The problem isn’t a virus, but a computer so old it belongs in a museum. I can’t even install the new protection they bought. I run a few updates and look around for the bathroom. That coffee goes through me fast. I tap my nails on the desk, hating that I have to ask Mindy where the bathroom is, though it’s not like she doesn’t use it herself.
 

The couple comes back to the front, and Mindy rings them up using an old-fashioned looking register. I hear her say the painting will be delivered tomorrow morning since it was too big to fit inside their car. They write her a check for over a grand and leave with smiles.
 

“Are you done yet? Did you get rid of the virus?” Mindy asks before the door closes behind the old couple.