Single Dad

by River Laurent

  Yes. That’s the way. Can I pull it off? I need to get myself together, otherwise he’ll know something’s up right away. I can’t let Lincoln down by screwing up something so important. I can’t let Ryland know what he’s done. I have to pretend nothing happened today, that I’m just as enamored of his skill and talent as I was when we last spent time together on Monday morning. We’re friends, pals, conspirators working together to bring Lincoln’s ultimate vision to life.

  What a crock of bullshit. What would Lincoln do if he knew the truth? I don’t need to think about it for too long. I stop pacing, calm myself, and to put myself in the right headspace. I have to be casual. If my father can pretend to be innocent and free of betrayal, so can I.

  I go over to my computer and make two small changes to the design. One obvious and another not so obvious. Then I save the design on a USB stick and slip it into my pocket.

  “Knock, knock,” I murmur when I reach the open door to Ryland’s office. He must have ordered lunch in. I can smell the onions on his sandwich from across the room. I wrinkle my nose, waving my hand in front of my face.

  “Yeah, yeah,” he laughs, shrugging. “I like ‘em.”

  “It’s a good thing you don’t share this office with anyone.” I chuckle. “That smell is obnoxious.”

  “I wouldn’t get onions on it if I had to share my office,” he assures me with a grin.

  Aww… what a nice guy, but you’d stab your best friend in the back for money. I grin back.

  “What can I do for you?”

  This is it. It’s now or never. “I wanted to pop my head in and confirm what I replicated this morning,” I explain. “But I can come back if you’re busy with your lunch.”

  “No, no, not at all, but that won’t be necessary. Lincoln already sent me the files.”

  I frown. “He did.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  “Well, I made a little typo in my report,” I confess, grimacing. “But I fixed it.”

  “A typo? That’s not going to help anyone,” he chides, but gently and with a smile.

  And I see it then. The slimy smile. I walk over. “I know, I know. I was so excited—”

  “Yes, yes, it is very exciting. What’s the problem?” he asks, pushing his smelly sandwich to the side and beckoning for me to come closer.

  Yeah, I’ll bet he’s more than happy to shove what’s left of his sandwich to the side in favor of getting more information from me. The creep. The liar. He used me. He probably doesn’t have any higher an opinion of me than my father has. Have they laughed together over how easy it is to lie to me? How easy it is to lie to Lincoln?

  I hand over my USB stick.

  I have to hold my breath over the scent of onions hanging heavy in the air, or maybe I just don’t want to breathe in the scent of him.

  He slots the USB into his computer and opens my file.

  “See? I accidentally typed a one-point-two-five instead of point-one-two-five in the measurements of the new fan vent. I mean, that would be way too much. The whole thing would fall apart for lack of a properly-placed decimal point. I’d never forgive myself.”

  He shrugs. “No big deal. You caught it in time. Well done. I’ll let the Big Boss know about it. Don’t worry he won’t be upset over this.”

  Oh, yes, you cretin. That’s exactly what I’m worried about. Lincoln getting angry with me over a perceived mistake. If my calculations are correct, the openings in the vent will still be much too small to allow enough heat to exit the body of the drone. When Arcane polishes up their prototype, it’ll crash during the demonstration. I hope.

  It’s my only hope. The only thing I can hang onto.

  I flash him what I hope is a grateful smile. Exactly the sort of smile I would’ve given him if I didn’t detest him the way I do now. “Thank you, as always. The last thing I need is for him to get on my case about yet another thing, you know?”

  He sighs, folding his arms. “I’ve told you already. I don’t want to be any part of the issues between you two. It puts me in a very uncomfortable position. I have a lot of faith in you, Sam.”

  Oh, sure, you do. You have faith that I’ll be stupid enough to let you keep using me until my father gives you what he’s promised. Whatever that happens to be. I want to ask him so badly. I want to know what could be important enough that it convinced him to betray the oldest friend he has, someone who trusts him like a brother. Judas had his thirty pieces of silver. How many pieces did Dad buy Ryland for?

  “You’re right, you’re right,” I mutter. “You know him better than I do. I bet the two of you have shared just about everything over the years. I can’t come in between that.”

  “Nothing ever could,” he replies, his face unsmiling.

  “Right. Catch you later,” I say walking away. I glance back at him as I reach the door.

  He is watching me with a smile.

  What a liar. I wonder how he can live with himself, how he can sleep at night.

  Then again, I’m a liar, too. I just lied to him. I think of feeding the false information to my father as I walk back to the little office. I let the locks engage behind me before I allow myself to lean against the door, suddenly shaking from head to toe.

  The tech conference is next week. One full week until the Arcane prototype fails in front of a crowd. I honestly don’t know how I’ll be able to wait that long, but it’ll be worth it when I have real, irrefutable proof to take to Lincoln. Without that, it will be no more than my word against Ryland’s, and as my boss just told me, he and Lincoln have shared everything throughout their lives.

  A bitter smirk shows itself on my face when I reflect on the one thing they don’t share—integrity.

  Lincoln

  I feel sick to my stomach, but there’s no other choice. I have to do this.

  Doing it means admitting she made a fool of me, but it also means refusing to be made a fool of any longer. I have to remember this. If there’s any hope of regaining my self-respect, it’s in this action. About time Weissman finds out I’m onto him, that I’m not so easily fooled.

  But you were easily fooled, you idiot. Look what she did to you. Look how easy it was for her to find a way into your life. Into your pants. Into your heart? That last bit is a question, taunting me. Making my skin crawl. Into my heart? Did she get there? I don’t know and I’m not sure I want to ponder that just now, as I take the elevator down to the lab.

  Accompanied by two security guards who will escort Miss Weissman out of my premises.

  Getting rid of Regina was easy, but getting rid of Sam is another matter altogether. Her claws are deeper in my flesh. God, I hate this.

  But I’m the boss, and it’s my job to make the tough calls. She’s lucky I believe in discretion, or I would’ve had her meet me in my office and paraded her through the top floor, so everyone would see, whisper and gossip behind us.

  We stop outside the lab and I take a deep breath. I know she’s in there. The security logs tell me she just entered not five minutes ago, and the door hasn’t opened since. I use my card key to get in, swinging the door open with determination.

  She lied to me.

  She thought she could get away with it. Nobody gets away with trying to make a fool out of me. My hands clench into tight fists as I catch sight of her. I can see she’s been deep in thought over something. The sight of her sends waves of nausea rolling through me.

  Sam looks up at the sound of the door, her gaze flickering over to where the two guards are standing, one over each of my shoulders. Her frown deepens, her eyes darken. “What is this?” she whispers.

  “What do you think it is?” I’m in the presence of two other employees. There can be no personal exchange here. Thank God, because seeing her again, makes me doubt my own eyes. How can she look so innocent? Yet, I saw her get into Weissman’s car.

  “I don’t understand.” She rises.

  Wasn’t I just inside her less than two hours ago? Wasn’t it good? The best?
/>   “It’s time for you to go. Now. You’re fired.”

  A host of emotions play upon her face, her expression shifting back and forth. “Wh-what? Fired? What did I do?” Her eyes bore holes into me, as though asking the question she doesn’t dare give voice to. Am I firing her for turning me down for lunch?

  Does she think I’m that petty?

  “Come on. Let’s go.” I’m at the end of my tether as it is, barely holding on to the last shreds of self-control. She used me. She lied. And lied. Again and again. Every damn thing was a lie. She even used my daughter to get closer to me. This realization is the final straw. I can’t even look at her.

  “Hurry up, please,” I bark.

  She fumbles for her purse, still obviously shaken by this turn of events. Did she think I would never find out? Well, I did. Weissman took a clever gamble by choosing her, but he underestimated me.

  “What’s going on, Lincoln?” she asks, her voice a hoarse whisper, pleading with me as she crosses the room. Not with words. With her eyes, as if she believes she deserves better than this. As though she deserves anything.

  What a laugh.

  “We’re leaving. Now.” I wave to the guards, who flank her as we exit the lab and walk down the hall. It’s empty, most people probably still taking late lunches, or hard at work. Good. I don’t want a scene, no matter how vile she is. I find it hard to hurt her.

  “Can I at least—”

  “No. You have no options here. You have no rights. You don’t seem to understand how something like this works.”

  “How something like what works?” She turns to me as we arrive at the elevators, eyes searching my face. “What is this? What is it, really? Please.”

  She’s a good actress. A damned good one. I can almost believe she’s truly stricken with grief over this turn of events. Her eyes, when I dare to meet her gaze, are wide with emotion and sparkling with unshed tears.

  Yes, she’s a good actress, and she fooled you. In all probability, she’s his lover. Don’t forget the way his hand moved to the small of her back when he picked her up.

  My heart hardens.

  “I’ll take it from here,” I advise the guards.

  They exchange a dubious look but fall back, allowing me to accompany Samantha into the elevator. Alone.

  The second the doors slide shut, she whirls on me. “I know why you’re doing this, but you’ve got it all wrong! I’m not the one who leaked the design to Weissman!”

  “Ah, so you know it has to do with a leak,” I snarl, eyes trained straight ahead. I won’t look at her again.

  “Please, please, you have to listen to me. Everything depends on this! I’m not the mole. It was Ryland all along. You have to believe me! It’s Ryland, Lincoln. I didn’t know it until this afternoon.”

  “You mean when you had lunch with Weissman?” I ask.

  Sam gasps. “You know about that?”

  “How else do you think I know what you’ve done?”

  “No, no, it’s not like that at all. Vince Weissman is—”

  “Please, spare me the lurid details,” I spit, cutting her off. “I don’t need to know who you are to each other, and I don’t want to know. All I know is, you took this job in order to steal the plans and give them to your boss. And then, you go ahead and blame one of my best people? My best friend, for Christ’s sake? What? Did Weissman warn you that I might be getting closer to the truth? That you might have to throw somebody under the bus soon?”

  “No, that’s not it at all, why won’t you listen to me?”

  “Because you’re only going to come back at me with lies, and more lies,” I snarl, sounding vicious even to my own ears. But it feels good to let go of the stinging pain of betrayal. I want her to hurt, too. “You disgust me. Is there anything you’ll stop at to get what you want? What your boss wants? Did he tell you to fuck me again if I got suspicious of you?”

  Her head jerks back as if I’d slapped her. “How dare you?” she breathes, eyes like saucers. Hurt.

  The incredible hurt I see on her face confuses me. I blink, then remember myself and force a laugh. It comes out sounding like a bark. “How dare I? That’s rich, coming from a whore like you. You make me sick. Just be grateful I’m not involving the police.”

  She swallows, and her face pales.

  Suddenly, I just want to hold her in my arms. My own weakness shames me. I lash out, “Did you use that body of yours to get in with Weissman? Is that why you’re so good at it? Because you’ve had so much practice?”

  And that was too much. I knew it when it was coming out of my mouth, and yet I let it out. I’m ashamed of myself for saying it, especially when her chin starts to quiver. My heart feels like there’s a knife in it. I’m better than this—at least I thought I was. Maybe I don’t know anything at all.

  Sam stands her ground. “I would rather be a whore than a pig-headed idiot like you who refuses to see the truth when it’s right in front of him.” A solitary tear rolls down her cheek, but she doesn’t brush it away. It’s an accusation of my cruelty.

  I shouldn’t have said it. I wish I could take it back, but it’s out. I frown. What the fuck am I doing feeling bad about hurting her feelings? She betrayed me. I owe her shit. If she doesn’t want to be called names, she shouldn’t do the things she does.

  Even so…

  When the elevator doors open, I realize this is it. I’ll never see her again. I’ll never get the chance to take back the awful things I just said. My body has a mind of its own, because before I can stop myself I’m reaching for her, wanting to apologize for my brutality.

  Sam looks down at my hand and sneers, shoving it away before bolting from the elevator and running through the lobby.

  I can’t exactly call out to stop her, so there’s no other choice but to watch her retreating figure as she runs out of my life forever.

  The doors slide shut.

  Lincoln

  Hey, Daddy?”

  I close my eyes momentarily. My nerves are frayed, and it’s becoming increasingly difficult to hold back my irritation for all interruptions, but it’s not Maddie’s fault. I have to deal with this without involving her. I exhale. “Yes, honey?”

  “How come I couldn’t stay home with Gwen tonight?”

  “She had other plans,” I murmur, looking over the stack of notes I’ve spent the last several hours going through, to no avail, I might add. But there’s got to be something here. There’s just got to be. “She told us when she took the job, remember? That she had something to do tonight and couldn’t spend the evening with you, but she’s usually free whenever we need her.”

  “But she’s free tomorrow?”

  “Yes.”

  “Tomorrow is the demonstration for the prototype, right Daddy?”

  “That’s right.” Every time I think about tomorrow, my chest tightens. The thought of my little girl being without a parent is the only thing keeping me from letting the stress take over completely. I’ll end up giving myself a stroke if I’m not careful. Where would that leave her?

  She’s sitting on a chair by the window, looking out, kicking her feet back and forth. Patient, for the most part.

  I remind myself that she’s much more patient than I would have been in her situation. At her age, I was fucking bouncing off the walls. “I’m sorry to make you hang around the office with me,” I say, chastised in the face of her sweet complacency.

  “It’s okay.” She smiles at her reflection in the window.

  “It’s just tonight. Tomorrow, you’ll be with Gwen for most of the day, and then…” And then, I don’t know what will happen. If we go bust, I’ll have a lot more time to spend with her. Maybe that’s not a bad thing. Not for her, anyway. Not in the immediate future. Long term, well, that’s another story. “We’ll be doing lots of things together.”

  “Until it’s time for me to go back to school again and make new friends,” she says, in a happy voice.

  “That’s right, honey.” I look away from h
er back and carry on pouring over Sam’s notes like the rest of like my life depends on it. Because it does. Mine, the company’s, my daughter’s. At the back of my mind is the fear that I never knew Sam, so I can’t trust my own judgement of her. What if she sabotaged the work in some small way? That is what I would have done if I were in her shoes.

  “Is Sam working downstairs?”

  An inexplicable hollow sense of sadness and loss fills my heart. I take a deep breath. If only my daughter knew what she’s doing to me by asking such innocent questions. “No, baby. She’s not.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I just do.”

  “Can we go and look?” she insists.

  My head whirls around in the direction of my daughter. “Maddie, enough.”

  I hate the look of surprise and guilt in her eyes when I glare at her, and instantly my anger dissipates. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be short with you. But you know how busy I am tonight. You’ll just have to take my word for it. Sam is not working downstairs.” Anymore. Not that her physical absence has done anything to remove her from my mind. She might as well be standing in front of me, right here and now. That’s how strongly I feel her presence.

  She blinks hard. “Sorry, Daddy. I just wanted to say hello.”

  “I’m sure she would like to see you too,” I say, swallowing back my disgust at myself. Why did I let my daughter meet her? No woman will ever get that opportunity again, until she has proven her worth. When I think of how Sam cozied up to my daughter, all in effort to get closer to me, it makes me rage all over again.

  Then, I remember how gentle she was when she washed Maddie’s face and feet after we got back from the fair. How she held her hand throughout the day, how the two of them giggled over the clowns and the street artists. There was a naturalness to their interactions. Nothing forced, nothing over-the-top. Nothing done for my benefit.

  All right, so she’s not a complete monster. The kid is charming and sweet, anybody with even a portion of a heart would fall for a kid like her. And that’s true. I believe it. Sam didn’t use Maddie to get to me.