Page 14 of The Probability of Us

He’s referencing the plethora of plants that found a home in my cubicle while he was gone.

“I’d invite you in for a house tour, but it seems I instead need to report a case of breaking and entering.”

“The door was open?” He’s pulling me along at a brisk pace to the only meeting room that can hold our entire department but looks over with that amused smile he always seems to wear around me. I laugh and he finally slows down as we near the meeting room.

“Oh, thank god,” he breathes as we enter the room, and he leads me toward the front corner of the room. “There’s still two seats available.”

I glance around the room and get even more confused. The seats around the large conference table are almost full but there are rows of seats still empty in the back. “There’s still plenty of seats available.”

“Look at the ground,” he whispers once we’ve taken our seats.

With so many people in here, I didn’t immediately notice, but when I look closely, I see that the back third of the room, where the majority of the seats are—and the only other remaining seats—is completely made of glass. I gulp wondering what would have happened if I had to sit on a pane of glass, twelve-stories up for two hours. My hands shake just thinking about it and I set my coffee on the table in front of me so it doesn’t spill.

He saved me from that. Heknewand he made sure I wouldn’t be put in a position that terrified me. He remembered the one joking comment I made about heights in our first conversation and saw through to the truth beneath.

“I see your feelings on heights haven’t changed,” he says, and I smile as I shake my head. “What about the people?”

“They’re still pretty great.” I look up at him and smile at the brightness I feel being around him again. Forgetting all about my fear when his face squishes together as he smiles. “Thank you.”

His eyes shift down to the coffee and his brows raise. “Stella Lei, how fancy.”

“It’s tradition,” I say and raise my cup at Ali, Trent, and Sterling who just arrived and head to the seats on the glass.

Ali narrows her eyes in, what I’m assuming is, a question as to why I’m sitting over here, and I nod down at the glass floor. She of all people should understand. Her eyes widen in understanding, and she whispers to Trent and Sterling who nod to me in a sort of apology.

* * *

Ali was right. I’m not looking forward to another one of those meetings. It was all numbers and updates that have nothing to do with what my team works on, except for ten minutes that focused on projects I’m involved in.

But there was one intriguing piece of news from the meeting.

“Congrats on the promotion,” I say once Warren and I are back in our corner. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I had to make sure you wanted to be my friend for me, not just my soon-to-be superior title. You know how it can be.” He shrugs and I fight back a laugh. “And since you’re talking to me more now than you did before, I think it’s fair to say my intuition was correct.”

My mouth drops open, incredulous. “Are you talking about last week? When you were gone all week and Icouldn’ttalk to you?”

“You could’ve texted.”

“I don’t have your number.”

“So, you would’ve texted?” He raises his eyebrows.

“You obviously wanted me to,” I tease, and he picks up one of the foam basketballs on his desk and lightly throws it at me. I laugh and a smile pulls on the corner of his lips.

“How about I drop the breaking and entering charges and we call it even?” I say.

He laughs. “Deal.”

Warren heads off for a meeting at the end of the day, but something stops me before I leave the office. IwantWarren’s number. My eyes land on the foam basketball and I have an idea.

I smile as I finally get on the elevator and soar closer to being on solid ground by the second, hoping that Warren sees the foam basketball I put on his keyboard and it makes him look at his plastic hoop where I left a sticky note with my number and the message:Ball’s in your court now.

I’m not even home when my phone dings with a new message.

Warren

Breaking and entering much?

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