Infini (Aerial Ethereal #2)(44)

He sidesteps and my face falls further.

No.

“Thora James.”

Muscular shoulders and a short stature, Nik’s twenty-two-year-old girlfriend stands at five-foot-two, her dirty-blonde hair wet from a shower. She’s dressed down in a baggy Ohio State shirt, a college that she dropped out of to pursue her aerialist dreams.

It’s not like she was given a job at AE for talent alone. She worked hard, and as a lead in Amour, she doesn’t need to get in any kind of trouble.

Thora looks around uneasily, stapled papers in hand. “I’m not really sure what’s going on. I was just stopping by to drop off some forms…” Her almost black eyes dart around the hallway. “I mean, I can come back later…” She starts stepping backwards.

“Don’t,” Geoffrey snaps, finger aimed at her forehead.

Thora tries to freeze, but papers fall out of her hand, and nervously, she trips over her own feet to collect them.

Dimitri laughs, but it dies as Geoffrey verbally scolds him. I don’t listen.

I bend down and help Thora collect her forms. I barely glance at the papers, but I do catch the word Wellness Policy. The forms must be normal and routine.

“Thanks,” she whispers to me. We stand up at the same time.

Geoffrey addresses us. “Congratulations, the seven of you will be signed up for a sexual harassment seminar tonight. You’ll be emailed the location and time. It’s mandatory, so don’t even contemplate skipping.” Storming back into his office, he slams the door.

Thora frowns. “Who was that?” She looks to me for answers, but Dimitri’s mouth is bigger than mine.

“A man who can’t take a joke,” Dimitri says.

Zhen picks up his Nike gym bag. “Maybe because it wasn’t funny, Dimitri.”

Dimitri cocks his head. “I saw you laughing.”

“Everyone was laughing,” Brenden cuts in, “but the humor kind of dies when we’re the ones getting into trouble for a prank we didn’t start.”

Dimitri scoffs. “Don’t know what you’re talking about—it’s still fucking funny.”

These arguments happen about every hour in our suite, and I stay out of it. Dimitri likes to hear his own voice, and Zhen has known him way too long for any real fight to start. He’ll pull Brenden out of the crossfire after a while, and it’ll all simmer down until it heats up again.

By now, it’s just ordinary.

Sergei steps forward. “Let’s just end this. Whoever set up the joke, go confess.” He wants someone to fall on a proverbial sword so he doesn’t have to go to the sexual harassment seminar.

(Predictable.)

No one speaks at first.

So I say the logical thing, “It could’ve been someone who fled into the gym.” I know a handful of cousins who would’ve put a dildo in Geoffrey’s office.

“Or it could be you,” Brenden retorts.

It stings, but our history together has always been strange. I can’t touch it now. I don’t want to, but I remember how moral he is. It’s a good quality. Something I admire. He started a petition when he was sixteen to have equal pay for all minors. The girls had a lower salary than the boys.

He helped get his sister, and mine, a pay raise.

And there I was stealing a souvenir cup and three bags of Cheetos.

I stuff my hands in my pockets. “It’s not me,” I say coolly, knowing why he’d believe it was.

“You could be lying.”

“Yeah, I’m not.”

“What about Dimitri?” Baylee asks, steering the attention off me.

(Thank you, Bay.)

“Not me, Baybay.” Dimitri walks backwards towards the elevators. “This is someone else’s genius handiwork.”

I watch him leave with Sergei, and Brenden and Zhen speak in Mandarin before following in tow. The only way out are those elevators.

Baylee is slower to exit. We barely speak at work unless it’s necessary, and we haven’t even tried to talk as frankly as we did in her suite. I worry that I might’ve scared her back then.

Her body is rigid, eyes pinned ahead. If she looks at me, it means she still cares about the possibility of us.

It means there’s something still worth fighting for.

It’s what I think. I stare intently, hoping. Praying she’ll glance back. She passes me, staggering slightly.

(Come on, Bay. Don’t give up on me. Don’t give up on us.) My stomach knots, and I fixate on her back as she leaves. Is it wishful thinking? Am I just dreaming—believing we could have something real outside of the gym?

She waits at the elevators, says something to her brother, and in the briefest moment, her head turns. Her eyes touch mine, and my lips begin to rise.

Hers pull up too. In a small, heartfelt smile.

“Okay, I’m…” Thora’s confusion steals part of my attention, then all of it as Baylee disappears onto the elevator.

I help her out. “That was Infini’s new choreographer. Let’s just say I could cough and he’d glare.”

Thora winces. “That bad?”

“Oh yeah.”

“He might not last long.” Always the optimist.

“Maybe.” In my world, bad things don’t disappear. They fester and extend for years.