Page 6 of Love Spell

Noah could take shouting.Since July, he’d learned to expect obscenities and raised voices and nerves stretched like bow strings along with the caffeine pills on desks and vulgar jokes and water-cooler gossip of his coworkers.

The biggest shouter of them all was Timo.Noah had grown up on the Alaska pipeline with his oil-engineer father, where long-bearded men still chewed tobacco, boasted about the racks on moose they’d shot, and dropped misogynistic comments with the casual ease of asking the time.

He wasn’t scared of a little rough talk or hard work.He was scared of his boss.Because Timo didn’t always yell.Sometimes Timo was as sweet and understanding as an encouraging elder brother.The man could be so charming, so sexy, then so damn explosive, working under his eye was more nerve-wracking than crossing thin ice on broken snowshoes.

Heart hammering, Noah glanced over his shoulder.No Dave or Arthur.Nothing but the backs of heads at trading terminals.They’d all heard “Timmy” coming and were working diligently.Just once, Noah was going to trick one of those jokers into saying that name in Timo’s earshot.Once would be enough.

His proper name was Timofei Volkov, sounding likeTee-mo, notTim-O, but trifling details like that didn’t worry Dave or Arthur.The trouble was that Dave said “Timmy” so often it was getting in Noah’s head.What if Noah slipped up one day and said it out loud under stress without thinking?Worse than any stutter, at least that would resolve the many issues of his visa expiring now that school was over, losing his rental flat weeks ago, and how to handle his enigmatic boss.He could only hope it would be a quick death.

Again, Noah swallowed.“I’m sorry.I’m just doing a coffee run.Back in five minutes.”

“Haven’t you done that already?”Timo appeared shocked, although how that could be the case was beyond Noah.

“Of course I have.”Noah edged away.At least Timo took the hint and released his shoulder.“But that was all of forty minutes ago.I’ll be right back.”

“Spencer can get this one.”Timo still smiled at him, making Noah’s flesh crawl.“Why don’t you show me what you’ve got on?”

“Uh…?”

“Working on?”Finally, Timo’s smile wavered, as if he was even confusing himself.

What did he think Noah had going on?He was trading.Supposed to be trading.Supposed to be at his desk paying attention, practicing honing his reflexes on the few screens he was trusted with as a junior.You had to be at Timo’s level to get twelve screens all your own.

Was this some kind of test?If so, Noah couldn’t imagine the purpose or what Timo was hoping to uncover.Something to chide him about?For all his eccentricities, most of Timo’s moods were not directed at Noah.They’d seldom spoken to one another since the interview in which Timo had told him on the spot he was hired and hadn’t batted an eye when Noah said he could only do the work for three months because of his visa status.

In another business, Noah might have wondered at anyone being so careless about how long they could hold on to employees, but these were prop traders: pirates.These men came and went as easily as the tides in their frantic rat-race to make not only a quick buck, but a quick few million.

Apparently, Noah wasn’t the only one at a loss with the conversation.A painful silence settled between them in which Noah’s mind raced for a way out and Timo blinked, scratched his eyebrow, and finally shook his head and turned away.

“Go on then.I think Spencer’s on the phone.”

Spencer, the PA, was indeed on the phone at his front desk by the door.But Timo wasn’t usually troubled by such details.

Dazed but glad above all to escape, now relieved for the coffee run, Noah did as told.

Later, he was still behind and still frustrated, although of course keeping his mouth shut, while he had to sit through a meeting with Timo lecturing the team about performance and how to make the most of the three algos they’d just bought to help spot opportunities in the market.Nothing special about that.Noah’s mind was back on where he’d be sleeping next week by halfway through.

He’d been lucky to find a place that would take a month-to-month lease — he’d assumed.Only for the owner to yank the apartment out from under him to sell it.He was crashing at a friend’s place from college until tomorrow when he had an Airbnb for five days.Then what?

He could pay for a place.He just couldn’t find a place.A real monthly rental wasn’t an option when he needed it for less than two months.Everything on Airbnb was booked up in chunks, with no way of finding a single place for so long in London last-minute.

That left living in a hotel, which he could also afford, but would be a massive chunk of cash when he desperately needed to save this money since he’d no idea where he was going to live or work once England spat him back out into the States.

Living in denial, he didn’t even have a plane ticket yet.How could he buy a ticket when he didn’t know what city he was going to?And how could he set up interviews when he didn’t have a second to call his own and think and find jobs and send off cover letters in the first place?His whole life since his interview with Timo had been work, find housing, work, move, work, find housing, work, work, and more work.Oh, yeah, and trying to learn the job.

He needed to pay out whatever it took to stay in a hotel so he could at least focus on what came next.But could he even find a hotel room for that solid chunk of time at this point either?No.He’d been looking.Yes, he’d set search-tool budget limits, but he wasn’t going to spend £300 a night on a hotel room for several weeks.

He wouldn’t spend that kind of money on a room even for a three-night luxury holiday.He needed to save every cent right now.Even £100 a night was too much.So, London hotels were out.Not that many were available either, with random weekends and bank holidays booked out.He’d looked up to £200 per night and still found nothing.He’d have to break it up — a hotel for a week or two, an Airbnb for a few days, then another hotel.

Sounded hellish, but he would sleep under his desk before spending through the nose just to stay in London until late October.Angela wanted to help, but her flat was already crammed with two roommates and Noah was on the couch while the girls wanted the use of their TV and living room.

Really, sleeping under his desk wasn’t a terrible idea.Instead of invading her place again, just stuff his bags into the coat closet and curl up here.

He’d slept in old trappers’ cabins on freezing wood floors in a sleeping bag with nothing but a caribou hide under him as a boy because his dad found such wholesome adventures stimulating.He could handle a temperature-controlled office for a night or two.None of the team had to know.He’d just make a point of being up and at his desk by the time they got in.Being the first one in could only be a good thing in Timmy’s eyes.Shit.Timofei, Timofei, Timofei.

Noah loved the Russian classics.This, with an interest in his own family heritage tracing back to Eastern Europe and southwest Russia, had instilled a fascination with the culture into him.Too bad about their politics and leaders and wars and state of the world, yes, but Noah couldn’t help his own interest shaped on the epics that he still devoured, or had up until this job.

When he’d first asked his new colleagues, purely making conversation, if Timo was Russian, Dave had gone on about much Timo loved to reminisce about the Motherland, and advised questions Noah should ask about his hometown and childhood to get Timo talking.

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