Storm and Silence (Storm and Silence 1)

Bring me file 38XI301.

Rikkard Ambrose

All right. So, at a guess I’d say he wasn’t pining with passionate love for me.

So he didn’t want me.

Ergo: the kiss never happened.

Well, so much the better. I wasn’t even a tiny bit disappointed. No, I wasn’t. After all, the fact that last night’s more… intimate occurrences had just been a dream had been what I had been trying to convince myself all the time. Now that I knew it was true, I ought to feel nothing but deep satisfaction.

Ought to, yes, but…

Hurriedly, I stood up and marched to the shelves of files. In no time at all, I had discovered the required document and transported it to the door. I reached for the doorknob, turned it - and almost ran headlong into a closed door. A very unladylike word escaped my lips as I stumbled back, the file clutched to my chest.

What the…!

I tried the door again. I hadn’t been mistaken. It was firmly and utterly locked.

‘Hey!’ With my free hand, I pounded against the heavy wood. ‘What’s the matter? Why is the door locked?’

Silence.

‘Didn’t you hear me? I said why is the door lock-’

A soft plink interrupted me. Turning my head, I saw that another metal cylinder had arrived on my desk. Mystified and annoyed, I stomped over to the desk and grabbed it. Now what would he have to say?

Because I locked it.

Rikkard Ambrose

I took a deep, cleansing breath, trying to calm my stormy temper. It didn’t work.

Crossing out the original with maybe a little bit more force than strictly necessary, I wrote under his message:

Dear Mr Ambrose,

And why did you do that?

Yours faithfully

Lilly Linton

Ha! I wondered what he was going to say now. Was he going to claim you could work more efficiently with all the doors locked? I wouldn’t put it past him, the stingy, stony old…!

Plink.

Ah!

Mr Linton,

It is a measure to further your abstinence and thereby the efficiency of your work. There is a liquor store only two streets away and a sweetshop selling solid chocolate right beside it. From your behaviour at the tavern, I deduced that keeping you locked up is the only way to prevent you from succumbing to irresistible urges.

Rikkard Ambrose

How on earth did he know I liked chocolate? Wait… irresistible urges? My eyes sparked!

I’ll give him irresistible urges!