One Week (HaleStorm) Read Online Free Page A

password encryption? Really? Do you also have a wooly mammoth in the staff kitchen to help wash the dishes?”
    “Elise.” He scowled.
    Perhaps she should have left well enough alone. Her inner imp couldn’t help but try to get a rise out of him the way she always had when they used to work together. When they were more like friends than coworkers. The way his eyelids hung heavy and his full mouth was set with so much tension, she only wanted to make him relax a little.
    “What about chisels and stone tablets for note-taking?”
    Michael may have tried to hide it, but the corners of his mouth turned upward. The lines on his face eased. “Check the supply cabinet. You’ll probably find them near those highlighters you asked me about earlier. So to save time, we focus first on the red, yes?” He turned his attention back to the spreadsheet.
    “Exactly.” Elise leaned sideways to flip pages. “And you’ll notice some of these are faster to answer than others. So we go through the spreadsheet, hit the straightforward ones first, and then we save the complicated ones for later. Sadly, this is one situation where quantity matters more than quality. I may be confident that I can finish this project before the deadline but I always like to hedge against unexpected speed bumps.”
    It was impossible to ignore the lingering spices of his cologne when she stopped for breath. “Right now, let’s go ahead and skip anything so straightforward a chimp could answer. I got Tom to hook me up with a login to your development system so I can easily see with my own two eyes whether or not you actually do protect your passwords. No reason to waste the CEO’s valuable time on that stuff. How long do I have you for, anyway?”
    When he lifted his head to answer her, their mouths were nearly close enough to practice buddy breathing. “As long as it takes.”
    Suddenly Elise realized her lips were very dry. She wanted to lick them but there was no way in hell, because nuh-uh, no sir, no way was she going down that road again. Damned if the possibility didn’t make her throb all over, and she kind of hated herself for her body’s reaction.
    You’re supposed to be mad at him, remember? He hurt you. He jeopardized your career. She didn’t want to empathize about his difficult relationship with his family, or be grateful to him for bringing her dinner. To remember how much she used to enjoy his company. And yet, the conflict of emotions battled in her chest like a pair of Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots.
    “That’s really....” She cleared her throat and backed away from the heat of his body so she could finally lick her lips. She took it a step further and dug around in her purse for lip balm. Placing an object in her lap gave her the flimsy illusion of an added barrier between them. “Thank you. For helping.”
    “It’s my company. At the end of the day, it’s my ass on the line.” She’d never seen him so serious, his eyes so black.
    Elise tried to make light as she smoothed on some cherry Chap Stick and dropped her purse to the floor. “Then again, if I fail and you complain to my boss or refuse to pay for the project, it’s my ass.”
    It was one of those jokes that really wasn’t. He didn’t answer, but the heavy weight of his gaze lingered, resting on her. She turned and refused to face him, refused to acknowledge the doubt she’d seen written on his face earlier that day.
    She’d faced forward to adjust her laptop when his hand landed on her arm. She turned again to find his eyes hard, like she’d never seen them before. “Michael—Mr. Hale.”
    “You can fail at this project. I can call PermaSolv to complain. I can have you fired.” He leaned closer. “None of those save the jobs of thousands of employees or my father’s lifetime of hard work. Those are the things that are on the line. So you bet your ass that I will see this through personally.”
    The place where his hand touched hers burned. “I