3. EVERETT

After not getting much sleep, I should've been grouchy, hunched over my office desk with a triple shot concoction nestled in my hands. Instead, I was standing with my view from the office out into the gloomy sky take over the city and a smile on my face.

A gentle tap came at the glass door behind me before the swoosh of it opened. "Surprising you're in, it's a Saturday," Sophie Blake, the head of client relations at Zyber.

"It's a good day," I told her, turning on a foot.

She was young, recruited fresh out of college and had worked here for a short time but proved herself to be an asset. "I've got venue paperwork, waivers, and everything else you requested from me at five in the morning." She sat the large stack of files on my desk.

The world of cybersecurity operated every day, around the clock. When we stopped, everything went to shit. "I hope I didn't make you come in on your day off," I said.

"I'm working until lunch, and then my fiancé is taking me out to some fancy restaurant," she said.

I sat in my black leather office chair and tucked myself into the glass desk. "This could've waited until Monday," I said. "But thank you."

"It's really no problem," she said. "Is there anything else you need while I'm here?"

"No, no, you should go and enjoy your day," I told her. "I'll get through this."

"You should also go and enjoy your day," she said. "Have you even been to bed yet?" She chuckled. "I saw the report you sent through as well."

"No other CEO has as much hands on control as I do," I said, waking my computer with a tap of a key. "Companies trust me, and I trust me to give our clients the best possible treatment, well, I trust you too."

"And it took you a long time for that to happen," she said. "So, if you really don't need me, I might actually head out. I've been wanting to buy some new heels before the stores get busy. Oh god. You don't want to hear about that."

I waved her off. "Please, go. I'm going to be in here busy." Although the reality of it was waiting on her to get to me with the files for the venue last night.

Pulling a USB drive from an attachment dangling on a chain around my neck up over my head, I plugged it into the work computer. It was my personal drive that unencrypted all my personal passwords, as long as I entered the right passcode and gave the thumb pad a full rolling print read. There was a lot of information on my computer, and perhaps it was just the cybersecurity CEO in me, but I was paranoid about it.

The company owned a lot of propriety tech, some of which I'd created, and others we'd acquired and developed. We offered a full three-sixty digital protection service that included cameras which could scan faces and store them on local data banks, great for on-site protection, but our main focus was computer security and keeping companies safe from having their data hacked or stolen.

From the file, I was given a list of employees at the company. I didn't care for any of it, except for one name. Bryce. Bryce O'Conner, 29, lived in Bushwick. He was right there, listed as a disk jockey three nights a week.

I cracked my knuckles. "Let's see what else I can find out about you, Bryce." He'd spiked my curiosity, and I liked to vet guys I met, even through accident or coincidence. It was part of the paranoia, I suppose. He was all the things I looked for in a partner. A soft side, submissive hints, and the princess was the cherry on top. Role play was my favorite.

It took my computer a couple minutes to pull up all the information the internet had to offer about Bryce O'Conner. I paused before clicking on any of the links. The rush of realization that this was potentially a rather large betrayal of future trust. That assumed there was a future.

Another knock came at the glass door. Dressed in an oversized hoodie, baggy jeans, and a large bag over his shoulder, my childhood best friend, Daniel wasted no time walking inside my office. "I just saw Sophie," he said. "I can't believe you've got her working on the weekend."

"I don't," I grumbled.

He laughed, throwing himself into the seat across from my desk. "Yeah, yeah."

"What are you doing here anyway?"

"You were supposed to meet me for breakfast like two hours ago," he said. "I obviously didn't hang around. I figured you'd forgot."

I recalled a little reminder flash up on my phone earlier, but I was so focused on not being focused that I'd forgotten all about it. "Something came up."

"I guessed," he said, sitting his feet up on my desk, almost knocking the files. "You have any work for me?"

"Right," I mumbled, a smile on my face. "That's why we had breakfast scheduled." I glanced at his feet, a growl in my throat.

He quickly laughed it off and slipped his feet off. "Relax, Rett," he said. "They're not dirty."

"It's Everet. Nobody but my dad called me that. And yes, they are dirty. I'm guessing you've walked through the city, on the subway, and amassed a bit of filth on your soles," I said. "They're not clean. And please, try and dress up when you come into the office. Even if it is the weekend."

"I'm freelance," he said, shifting his weight in the seat to lean forward. Now, pressing his greasy fingers and face to the glass. "I'm not confined to those stuffy suits with corporate nooses."

For thirty years it was the same thing, ever since we were kids. I was orderly and clean, while he would seek out every dirt path and roll around in it. But it's probably why we were good friends, he offered me fresh perspectives.

"While you're here, there is one thing," I said, glancing at the links on the monitor. "I met a guy."

"And sucked his soul out with your stellar personality?" he laughed.

"Whatever. I'm not—"

"No, go on," he said. "It was a joke. Tell me about this guy."

"It was brief. We met at a nightclub."

Daniel cackled, pushing himself back from the desk. "Shut up. You didn't meet a guy in a nightclub. You've never even been to a nightclub."

"Well, I did meet him there. And now I'm trying to decide whether or not to go through everything he's ever posted to the internet," I said.

Daniel grabbed the sleeve of my suit jacket. "Fuck. You weren't kidding," he said. "That's glitter." He came around to my side of the desk. "Is this him?"

"Don't touch it." I yanked the mouse away from his hand. "I just don't know what to do yet."

"I always search up my dates before we go out," he said. "I like to know what her interests are, and slip them into conversation, you need to know how to play it cool though. I don't think you've got that in you. You just play it cold."

"I shouldn't have told you," I grumbled, raising an arm to block his view of the monitor. "We only spoke for a couple minutes, but I felt something. Like a spark."

Daniel touched my shoulder. "Was it a dream? You know, the whole nightclub thing and now a spark. I'm actually beginning to question your mental state."

"I've barely slept as well, but that's what happens when I drink coffee too late, and then force myself to keep drinking it so that I don't crash in the middle of the day," I said, my fingers agitated in wrapping tap on my glass desk. "So, it looks like I'm either going to drive myself insane thinking about this guy, or I'm going to satisfy my primal urge to find out every detail about him and spoil all the fun we might've called a future."

"Whoa, hold on, Everett," he said, whacking my arm. "You actually have some feelings in that cold heart of yours."

My teeth sank into the tip of my tongue. I didn't like that I was considered calculating, cold, or even meticulous. Sometimes, there was fun to be had in the chaos and disorder of a wand that sprinkled glitter in every which way.

"Relax," I said, mostly to myself in a deep breath. "Will you have a look for me?"

"Why do you need me to look?"

"I just—" I glanced at the screen and his name, hyperlinked. "I don't want to waste my time on someone who I'm not compatible with."

Daniel shrugged. "Compatibility is subjective. You might not go together on page. You know, you said you met him in a nightclub, and the last time you went to one of those was when I forced you, with Mark after securing the first multi-million dollar contract."

A smile touched my lips. That had been a fun night, a fun night when we were all a lot younger. I was thirty-eight now, and I needed a sleep schedule with custom Tempur-Pedic mattress in order to feel refreshed.

He tugged on my chair, wheeling me out from under the desk. "I'll check for you, make sure there's no glaring red flags, like minor stalking charges, or access to databases that crawl the web for entire life data," he grumbled.

I knew what I was planning on doing had been a little over the top, in a way, it was doing a background check on someone who was coming into the fold, and he worked at the venue that had employed me. Although, the reason for my search was purely selfish, I wanted to know if he was playing princess as a joke, or whether he was into the role of a princess, a sweet submissive princess looking for a king or master.

"Do you even know what you're looking for?" I asked as he stood in front of the monitor and started clicking. "Because you might not know what's going to stick out like I would."

"Turn around," he said. "Bryce O'Conner, works at a nightclub, a bunch of credits on songs as producer. TV shows I've never heard of, The Drag Goes On , and Drag It Up. "

I couldn't control the smile burning into my cheeks. "Competition TV shows," I said. "I've never watched them, but we did cybersecurity for their production company."

"It says here his driving license is almost expired and he's never been out of the country," he continued. "But he's never been in any trouble. And yes, I know what to look for. I think you might be forgetting that I helped design a lot of these databases."

"Is he—" I didn't want to know the answer, my tongue once more fighting for its life after my teeth sank into the tip. I sucked in a deep breath, staring out of the ceiling to floor window and the gloomy sky outside.

"Single," he said. "Lives alone, nice apartment from the old listing I found as well."

"Ok, ok." I spun around. It didn't really inform me of anything. "I don't think—"

"Ahh, you'll like this one," he said, turning to me with a big smile. His body blocked my view of the monitor. "He belongs to that kinky club you invested in."

"The Playhouse Club?" I mustered, near breathless from surprise. "Are you sure?"

Daniel slowly nodded. "Yep. Is that what you wanted to know?"

"Yeah. You can close the window," I said, shying my head down. "I guess I'm gonna have to try and bump into him again."

"I'm turning it off," he said. " You should probably be in bed, instead you're here, covered in glitter and I can see those bags under your eyes. Anyone else would say you looked insane, but we're friends, and I'd never say something so hurtful." He laughed, pushing my expensive chair with his dirty shoe.

Daniel was right though. I must've looked absolutely maniacal. "I'm not going to sleep just yet," I grumbled, dusting the seat where his shoe had been. "It would ruin the rest of my sleeping pattern."

"Time to give that up," he said. "If you're pursuing a piece of ass that works during the evening, your schedule is going to take a turn, but on the plus side, this place runs itself mostly."

Grinding my teeth, I glared at Daniel. "This place needs a leader. Me. And I've always been hands on."

He shrugged. "I was just suggesting that you can afford to take a break, it's not like you need to use any PTO, you run payroll," he said. "Speaking off, the reason I came by. I need a little work. If you have anything for me. Maybe a server maintenance gig."

I stood. "There's always work for you here," I told him. "But you're also right. I shouldn't be here on the weekend. I should be making myself look like I had hobbies and fun outside of work." I'd worked myself into a mundane habit it seemed, and my immediate thoughts were on what Bryce would've seen if he searched for me.

"I mean, you can still assign me somewhere before you go," he said.

"Monday," I told him as I marched toward my office door.

"Then what about an advance?"

"You blew through a hundred thousand already?"

"That was four months ago," he said. "I was taxed on it, and then I might've splurged a little." Daniel grabbed his large bag and approached me.

"You have your apartment, right?" I asked and he nodded. "You have food." He nodded again. "Then what do you need an advance for?"

I saw the apprehension in his eyes.

"If you don't tell me, I can fire that computer up again and see," I said.

"I owe some money out, bad investments," he huffed. "You know I wouldn't ask if I didn't need to."

"What I do know is that you wouldn't ask me during the week. You know Mark would talk me out of helping you." Mark was the COO at the company and someone I considered to be a good friend. We'd known each other since college. He graduated while I dropped out when I saw my tech take off.

"Just ten grand," he said. "And I'll work it off."

There was a reason Daniel was no longer fully employed here, and it was because of his habit of getting into trouble. The company couldn't risk him anymore. He called himself an ethical hacker, which was a kind way of putting it, he stress tested software for the company, and he was good at it.

I pulled my phone from my suit pocket. "I'll transfer it over," I said. "But I want you here on Monday morning, clean shoes, nicer clothes. Please. I don't want security attempting to escort you out before you're even in the elevator."

He nodded. "You're a life saver, Everett. I swear, naming my first child after you."

"You've said that before." Going through several security checks to get into my online banking, I eventually transferred over the funds to Daniel. I didn't know for sure what he needed the money for, and the less I knew, the better actually. "I'm just glad your apartment is paid off."

"And it's in my mom's name," he chuckled. "I don't need anyone finding me there."

"Yeah, well, just make sure it's put in a trust before she—you know, you don't want to be stuck footing the tax bill for the inheritance on it," I said.

Daniel let out a groan. "Relax," he said. "I know what I'm doing. We should really be more concerned with your thing. Like, come on, you've got a crush. And I don't think I've ever seen you have a crush on anyone, other than Project Obsidian, which net the company a tidy profit." He gave me a wink.

"Aren't you still under NDA for that?" I asked him.

"Relax, it's just you," he said, gently whacking my arm.

"Well, I'm going to take your advice and actually take the rest of the weekend off. I don't know what I'll do, but something active to keep me from searching up Bryce," I said.

Daniel placed an arm around my shoulder as we walked out of my office. "Listen, between friends, I think he sounds great for you," he said. "And now you have a clean conscious, you didn't search him on your super computer." He snort laughed. "But a regular web search is normal. Besides, you met him last night, you wanted to find out more information. If anything, this is the most normal behavior I've seen you exhibit."

I was an overthinker by nature. I liked to be two steps ahead of every move I was going to take. The thought of being behind a curve or allowing someone to have an upper hand sent me into a tail spin of anxiety. I needed control.

"I think I'll take a walk," I said aloud, but mostly to myself.

"Good luck, I think it's going to rain."

"I hope it does," I mumbled.

As we stood at the elevator together, Daniel grabbed his phone. I saw relief on his face in the reflective metal panels. I liked helping him when I could, but Mark had warned me a couple times about how he could become reliant on me, even though he had the skillset to be making the money I make.

From the offices to the entry level, it took about thirty minutes.

"Good luck out there," he said.

"I don't need luck, I just need to be alone with my thoughts." I knew if I stopped for even a second, I'd be searching Bryce's name, or asleep and ruining my sleep pattern for good.

I realized quickly. I was lust sick.