Chapter 5

Christian

I look over the details again, though by this point, I could recite them. Cameron Robert Westerley. Born August 10, 1989 to Martin and Michelle Westerley. High school nerd turned Harvard graduate. Created his magic robot algorithm in Boston before moving here to be my new pain in the ass. And most notably, romantically linked to Anastasia Steele for the last six years.

I wonder if they'd met by the time I finally got through to her.

Thankfully, I don't have much time to dwell on that thought. I see the maître d' approaching with a young man in an ill-fitting suit, and I know that's my guy. I stand to meet him. "Mr. Riedel."

Collin Riedel. Born April 18, 1994. MIT graduate. Notoriously principled rising figure in AI, being courted by multiple major tech companies but has thus far stayed a freelancer. Let's see what a private audience at the Mile High can do about that.

He smiles nervously. "Mr. Grey."

We shake, and I'm pleased that his palms aren't clammy. "Please have a seat."

He nods and sits down. "This is a very nice place."

I nod in acknowledgement. "Well, GEH is quite intrigued by you. And I'm a member here, so I trust in the discretion. Would you like a drink?"

"Uh, a Scotch would be great." I signal the waiter loitering in the corner, and he makes himself scarce. "Tell me, what have you thought about our facilities at GEH?"

He clears his throat. "The best I've ever seen, sir."

"Some say the same about you."

He shrugs modestly. "We're all good at something."

"And how have you found my team?"

"Excellent. Discerning, cutting edge. There's no shortage of bright ideas under your watch."

"Well, you've made it to the final round. Tell me how you can be an ally to me."

"I can see several areas in which GEH would benefit from implementing automation, chatbots, adaptive intelligence, algorithm trading, and machine learning, amongst other things. Your team also explained your current data security procedures to me, and I'm in the final stages of developing an algorithm that would determine cyber attacks in a much more efficient way."

I nod. "And what about robotics? As I'm sure you know, there's someone new in town who's making great strides in that area."

"Yes. But Westerley Tech focuses primarily on intelligent humanoid robots and e-commerce. I know that GEH puts quite a lot of money into agriculture, and AI is emerging in this field. Agriculture is applying AI to things like agriculture robotics, soil and crop monitoring, predictive analysis. And this is not replacing human jobs. This can be very helpful for farmers. I have a particular interest in this. If you want to move into robotics, you could very well become a world leader in this area of it."

Music to my ears. The waiter returns with his Scotch. I raise my own glass and he looks momentarily surprised before raising his in return. "You have my attention."

He nods once, seeming to play it cool, but I've been in business long enough to be able to smell the enthusiasm rippling off of him. It's dancing behind his eyes. "It would be my honor to be an ally to you, sir. At the risk of sounding arrogant, I know that I'm one of the best at what I do… and I'd dare say I'm the best one currently in this city, if you catch my drift."

It's been a very long time since I've had any personal involvement in the changing of my staff, but this felt like it required a more personal touch. "I'd like to onboard you for three months. See what you can shake up around here. After that, we'll re-evaluate. You'll have creative control and be able to assemble your own team. And you will answer to me directly. Are you interested?"

He smiles triumphantly. "Immensely, sir."

"Welcome to GEH."

We spend the rest of our allotted time in the private room finishing our drinks while Riedel attempts to explain to me the basis of one of his algorithms. It's all the same to me, kid, just help me make Westerley sweat. An optics-driven part of me is enjoying the fact that I've got someone five years younger than the so-called next Christian Grey on my side now. And admittedly, the personal vendetta side of me is hoping this kid can make him all but irrelevant.

But I must be softer than I thought, because along with this thought comes a quiet voice reminding me that if I take him down, I may also be taking her down. What if he makes her happy? What if he's everything she's ever wanted and he's going to give her the world on a string with his new fortune? I never thought myself capable of putting someone else's well-being before my own, until I heard her begging voice over the phone.

I can't, Christian. Please, no more. Don't look for me anymore. If you ever had any warm feelings for me, please, just let me go.

Take care of yourself. And please understand that this is my way of caring for myself. Please help me do that.

I admit, initially, I couldn't do that. I called her only to be sent straight to voicemail maybe a hundred times in a row. But I'd contacted her to offer her everything I was capable of giving. Safety, companionship, comfort, and… love. At least, I would have tried. When I recall the way I had been torn apart by her absence, if that wasn't love, I can't imagine what is.

Whatever my feelings for her were, she had asked one thing of me. Let her go. Help her take care of herself. My final act was listening.

In the years since, I've come to wonder if maybe she was right to leave. Maybe someone as warm and gentle as her was always meant to run from something like me. She's smart, and I know she loved nothing more than a romantic novel. She would be able to see through an anti-hero. And realistically, I didn't know how to do the things I was considering for her. I had no experience being a boyfriend.

And now she has a fiancé. The pangs that accompany that are wholly foreign to me. And as I replay the scene where we met again in my mind, the defining characteristic of it is the realization that Ana is now foreign to me. I don't know who she's grown into in the last seven years. She didn't give away much, and in all likelihood, she won't be around me to give me any more clues.

I drain my glass.

Riedel follows suit. "Thank you for the opportunity, Mr. Grey."

I stand and we shake again. "Use it wisely. I'll see you tomorrow morning."

I see him out, ignoring the eyes that follow us as I show him to the elevator. I watch the doors close on him and Taylor discreetly walks up next to me. "Home, sir?"

I shake my head. I rarely feel this way, but I'm not up to the cavernous solitude of my abode just yet. "Drink first."

I make my way to the bar and order another. Something in the air feels strange, like there's an undercurrent of something about to happen. Maybe a natural disaster, maybe a miracle, who knows.

"A double Scotch, please, whatever is top shelf, and I'll have a pinot grigio."

That soft voice confirms my suspicions. Natural disaster or miracle, I don't know, but Anastasia is standing mere feet away from me, leaning against the bar.

My neck nearly snaps the moment I hear her, and my eyes drink her in. She's wearing a long red dress, her hair flowing behind her back. The arch of her neck, the curve of her jaw, the shapeliness of her shoulders… there were still some traces of girlhood youthfulness back when I knew her, but she is pure womanhood now.

It was easier to keep my unspoken promise to her when she wasn't in my sight. Now, a moth to a flame, I find my feet carrying me towards her. "Miss Steele."

She jumps, and her head turns so fast, I worry about whiplash. But she seems physically unharmed as she pins me with a piercing stare. "Mr. Grey. We must stop meeting like this."

Despite what she said, I laugh. I realize I do keep sneaking up on her. "I apologize if I startled you. But in all fairness, you're the one at my club." I say teasingly.

She smiles back, but it doesn't touch her eyes, and she looks away. "I should have known."

"Are you alone?"

"No. Cam and I have a private room."

"Ah." I poke the bear once more. "Date night?"

She laughs once, humorlessly. "Business dinner. I'm just arm candy." I would almost think that there's a bitterness to her tone, but I can't tell.

"It seems like you're just fetching drinks. Is it primitive of me to feel like the man usually does that?"

She has been avoiding eye contact with me this whole time and continues her inspection of the shelves behind the bar. "He's in the zone. It's easier if I do it."

How unchivalrous. "If you say so."

"What about you? Are you fetching drinks for a fetching lady?" She finally looks at me, albeit out of the corner of her eye.

What a ridiculous thought. Would she not like that? "No. I just concluded a business dinner myself. It went well, and I thought I'd have a celebratory drink before I go."

She nods, looking away again. "Congratulations."

"I haven't turned over that kind of new leaf since we last spoke, Anastasia." I have no idea why I'm telling her this. She probably doesn't care, and I don't know why I care for her to know. But she did start it.

Her thumb on her left hand reaches over to fiddle with her engagement ring as she continues to stare into space. "Yes. I remember. You don't do the girlfriend thing."

I'm surprised by the direction this has taken. And I feel a rush of frustration, because she of all people knows what a half-truth that really is. "Maybe you don't remember everything then."

She finally turns to fully face me, just as the bartender is bringing me my last. "Well, it doesn't matter what I remember now, does it?"

The bartender has also brought the drinks she was waiting on, but she hasn't yet acknowledged them. "Tell me, how would your fiancé feel right now if he knew I was the one keeping you?" She supposedly has places to be.

Her face doesn't react to my implication. "I can't imagine he'd feel much of anything. He's not the sort of man who gets insecure when I speak to any random person."

"Is that your way of telling me that he doesn't know about us?" I ask softly, moving a bit closer to her ear. If the other diners are going to stare, I'll give them something to look at.

She meets my gaze, a fire behind her eyes. "There's nothing to know," she says firmly.

"Perhaps I do remember more than you, then. And I remember very well that I made you feel far more sensations than nothing."

She exhales quickly. Angrily, perhaps. "Nothing I could discuss, Mr. Grey. If you recall, there was an NDA involved."

"I shredded your NDA long ago." It's true, but I never thought I'd get a chance to tell her that.

Her eyebrows raise in surprise, but quickly level. "Fine. Nothing important, then. We knew each other for what, three weeks? It was no time at all."

I shake my head. "I know I didn't mean nothing to you, even if it was only for a moment. I thought people in relationships shared relevant details of their past like that?"

She snorts. "Well, you wouldn't know a lot about that, would you?"

She's avoiding the question. "So, you haven't told him how we passed those three weeks, then."

"What is the point of this?" she hisses under her breath, looking up at me with some combination of confusion and outrage. "I've had some time to think about what happened between us, and you know what I think? This was all a simple case of wanting what you couldn't have. I wasn't in your lifestyle, but you weren't used to being told no, so you just reached out and plucked me from the crowd anyway. Even here and now, you see me as a toy you can pick back up and manipulate because you're bored. Between subs, are you? You stand here and cryptically remind me of our past, in public, not to reminisce on what we once shared, but to use it against me and make me uncomfortable. Well, I'm sorry we had to move here and complicate your pristine life, but I assure you, I did not choose this. So, don't punish me because you can't have me."

Her tirade was so quiet, the hum of the other diners easily drowned out the details to anyone in earshot, but it's ringing in my ears. Her candidness in how she views me now cuts me to the bone, and I find myself tongue-tied. "I… simply meant that if we're going to be in the same circles, it might make sense for him to know. It's speculation. You're right, I don't know a lot about how this goes between couples." My head spins for a response to the allegations she's just thrown at me. "I fear I've misrepresented myself. I'm not trying to punish you, Anastasia, I'm—" I struggle with how candid I should be. "I'm stunned to see you. I've been stunned since the moment I did. Doesn't that seem fair? I never thought I'd see you again. I find myself wanting to know you as you are now, even though I know that doesn't make sense, but I'm just drawn to you. I always have been. And I don't know how to act around you. I left you alone after we last talked because you asked me to, not because I wanted to. Whether you can admit it to yourself or not, you must know that you've always been different to me."

I'm feeling exposed as I watch her gaze soften from anger to sadness. Maybe resignation. Maybe pity. God, not fucking pity… "No, he doesn't know," she finally says softly. "I thought there was an NDA. And truth be told, I've tried not to think about it."

"That we can agree on." She takes a sip of her wine, looking down at the dark wood grain of the bar. "Do you still want me to?"

She quickly looks up. "Want you to what?"

"Leave you alone."

Her expression changes, and she blinks a few times, as if in confusion. She starts to gnaw on her lip. I wish I could ask her to stop. We're in a very serious, maybe critical moment, and this is distracting in the worst way. But I don't think she'd take kindly to an order right now. "I have to go. He'll wonder where I am," she finally answers.

Or rather, doesn't answer.

So it's not a 'yes, get the fuck out of my life.'

"Anastasia." She doesn't look up as she gathers the drinks. "Ana," I implore. She turns to me now, appearing a bit alarmed that I used her preferred name. "I don't want to be someone you feel you have to avoid."

"I don't think I have to," she acknowledges. "Enjoy your drink. Good night."

And I watch her go, the walking contradiction herself. She hasn't explicitly told me to fuck off, though she certainly had the opportunity to tonight, and yet both times we've met, she can't get away fast enough. But she willingly stayed to talk to me after her drinks had arrived. Nothing about this makes sense.

Against my better judgement, I park myself into a booth so I can watch her go again. An hour later, I do. She emerges from one of the back private rooms, a step behind Westerley and another couple, the three of them talking animatedly. I recognize the man as someone from my report who I declined to even interview. She doesn't look up, appearing to be deep in her thoughts. They stroll through the main dining room, past the bar, and out of sight towards the elevators.

I also can't help but note that she doesn't look happy. And I feel that I'll think about that far too much tonight.

A/N: The beginning of this chapter was brought to you by me googling "applications of AI" lol.

I imagine the first leg of their relationship is going to have Kate and Anthony from Bridgerton vibes. I love it when the crush comes out with them fighting.