Thanks for the support so far! I don't think this will be a long fic—probably somewhere in the five to six chapter range.
"Now that's out of the way, how about I give you a tour?"
Paige sighed internally, trying her best to keep her reaction hidden from him. Mr. Jourdan—it's David, please, I insist—had already kept her in his office for nearly two hours, combing through every word in their contract with his lawyer and asking her far too many questions about her previous employment with Scorpion. She knew it would take time to build Centipede's reputation, independently, but the constant rehashing of her prior cases brought up too many uncomfortable memories. Describing her role in missions while delicately avoiding his name was exhausting.
Well, that's what you get for dating your boss.
David was staring at her, and she realized belatedly that she hadn't answered. Paige was dying to relax at home with a glass of wine and a hot bath, wash away this long and awkward day, but she found herself nodding instead. Consulting on his top-secret aerospace project was a lucrative job. If she wanted the deal to stay intact, she had to take one for the team. "Lead the way."
He smiled, walking over to the wall and pressing one hand against the palm scanner as he entered a code into the keypad with the other, blocking her view with his body. Paige still found it amusing that people hid things from them, like Centipede couldn't crack his security while simultaneously playing an intense game of Trivial Pursuit. She refrained from saying so. She'd been around the geniuses long enough to know jokes like that didn't go over well.
The bookcase shifted a few feet to the side—god, wasn't that a cliché—revealing a solid metal door. He tugged it open, motioning for her to step through ahead of him. "Please."
Paige offered him a smile back, albeit a half-hearted one, and followed his direction. She heard the door click shut, and felt his eyes on her as she started to traverse the narrow hallway. He liked her. She could tell. This was only their third meeting to discuss the deal in person, but he'd been a perfect gentleman every time. He was relatively young for his position—thirty-seven, according to her research—and fairly attractive, with dark blond hair and clear blue eyes.
He hadn't made a move, yet. It was more likely he would wait until the job was completed. She wondered if she would feel differently then.
David was nice. Successful. Wealthy. And she missed being in a relationship. She missed holding hands, being looked at affectionately, being held at night. Being wanted.
But she knew from experience that simply doing and having all those things wasn't enough. Now that she understood how intense the feelings could be…finding another man that made her feel the same seemed borderline impossible.
He found someone else. Why shouldn't you?
Paige blinked, hoping David didn't pick up on how distracted she was while he launched into a story about the construction of the tunnel. Maybe, with time, she would be ready to move on with someone like him. Hopefully sooner rather than later. She was tired of feeling so hollow.
He repeated each step at the second door, assuring her that they were "almost there" as he went through another litany of security measures. She wished she'd made a polite excuse to leave before she became literally trapped in the situation. David finally slid open the door, and Paige had to admit that she was taken aback by what was on the other side.
"Sorry for the process, I know it's a pain," he said, placing a hand on her arm to help her up the small step. "But this collection is worth a lot. We have to protect it."
Paige wasn't sure she'd ever seen a larger collection of art outside of a museum. She knew the company maintained one—and that the CEO loaned the paintings out periodically for special exhibits—but she hadn't been expecting to see it with her own eyes. "It's beautiful."
"I know." He stepped just behind her, pointing to a painting of a church on a hilltop. "This is one of my favorites. 1908. Rudolf Koller."
That's impossible, because Koller died in 1905. She glanced at him sideways, wondering if he was testing her knowledge, but his eager expression suggested that he was merely trying to impress her. At least when Walter spouted off facts, they were correct.
Paige pressed her lips together, chastising herself for her rudeness. At least he had an interest in art, something Walter still struggled to understand the purpose of. Stop thinking about Walter. He's not in the room right now. "Lovely. What about this one?"
David chatted amiably about the artwork for several more minutes, walking her through the gallery. She tried to hide her yawn behind her hand, but he noticed, looking sheepish. "Sorry. I'm sure you have other things to do."
She shook her head. "No, please, this is wonderful. I was just up early this morning. Thank you, again, for the tour."
"Of course." Mercifully, he took the cue and lead her back to the entrance, his warm expression morphing into a frown as the palm scanner flashed red and beeped. "That's odd. Just…I'll try it again."
Paige felt a small nagging fear deep in her stomach as he repeated the process, to no avail. "Does it malfunction often?"
The look on his face turned her fear into dread. "Never." David pulled his phone out of his pocket, shaking his head. "No signal. You?"
She already had it out. Nothing. Ralph had enhanced her signal strength tenfold one day while he was bored, so if she wasn't getting any bars, then one possibility emerged as the most likely scenario. "Mr. Jourdan, I think our phones are being jammed."
He didn't correct her this time. "Why would anyone do that? Maybe it's an experiment elsewhere in the building that's interfering?"
"Possibly, but…" Paige frowned, taking her comm out of her bag and switching it on. "Can anyone hear me?"
"Paige. Thank god," came the staticky reply from Sylvester. Now she understood why Walter had been so insistent on using less common frequencies for the devices. "We've been trying to get a hold of you. Where are you?"
"Mr. Jourdan was giving me a tour of their art collection. I'm in a secure room but the systems are malfunctioning. Why were you trying to get a hold of me? Is something wrong?"
"I don't know. We got an alert that MassTech was being evacuated. Something about a fire alarm. When we couldn't call you or get you on comms, we got worried."
Suddenly, Paige was regretting letting them sit this meeting out and stay in the office. There's nothing they can do to help this deal go through, and they're probably more likely to sabotage it. That had been her reasoning at the time, anyway.
Now… "I need you to get here ASAP. I don't know if this is an error or a hack. There's a palm scanner but I'm sure you can find someone with access." She lifted her head, looking at David, who was suddenly much paler than he'd been five minutes ago. "Who has access? And we need the code, too."
"Uh…" He shook his head and Paige could tell he was struggling to focus past his panic. "W-Wendell. The CEO. But he's on vacation in Europe. So…the CFO and the CIO. One of them has to be here. And me. That's everyone. And the code is 983672."
Paige relayed the information to her team, reminding herself not to freak out. This was hardly the most dangerous crunch she'd ever found herself in and if she could keep Mr. Jourdan calm, he wouldn't be the worst company in a crisis. "And hurry." She took in a strained breath, confirming her suspicions. "I don't think we're getting enough oxygen in here."
If possible, David went even whiter. "I-It's an automatic response. If there's a fire alarm in the building, the oxygen will deplete in this room as a s-suppression system. Normally I could control it, but nothing's responding."
"How long?" When he didn't answer, Paige grew impatient and snapped, "How long?"
"T-Thirty minutes before we're completely out of air. A-And if someone else is in control…I can't say."
Paige pushed down the ball of dread threatening to rise and adjusted her comm. "Sylvester, I need—."
"We know." She heard several car doors slam at once. "We're on our way, Paige."
It was getting hot. Paige gathered her hair in her hands, fishing for a tie in her purse to hold it back.
They hadn't bothered with yelling—the room was soundproof, and they need to preserve their remaining oxygen. Fortunately, Happy had managed to contact emergency crews on the scene. The police were searching for the executives with palm scanner access while firefighters were hedging their bets and drilling through the door leading to the tunnel.
They'd already been at work for fifteen minutes, which didn't give her much hope of them getting past both doors in time. But she had to have faith that Centipede would come through.
Scorpion never fails.
She swallowed. They weren't Scorpion. Perhaps it was selfish that in her own hour of need, she wished they were.
The drilling halted abruptly and the first door swung open, a few seconds passing before a hand banged twice solidly on the door in front of her. She was so relieved she nearly burst into tears, even before the words echoed in her comm. "Paige? Can you hear me?"
She clasped her hand over her mouth, startled by the voice. "Walter?"