The Boy Who Has No Hope (Soulless 6)

I didn’t have the time to be away from my office in the lab for that, but I also didn’t think she needed my supervision. “You can just use mine.”

She turned to me, slightly surprised. “I think it’s best if I have my own pin. Then you know it’s me coming and going. And I’ll give the cleaning lady her own pin, after I get everything organized and locked up safely, of course. Is that okay with you?”

“Yes.”

She stared at me for a few more seconds, obviously surprised this task was so easy to accomplish.

She’d been working for me for months now, and she was clearly full of integrity and honesty. Unless this was some performance to get what she wanted and sell my secrets to my competitors—but that seemed outlandish. She’d have to be a psychopath at that point. Maybe someone would figure out how close she was to my work, that she had access to my files, and they would offer her an outrageous sum to get copies of everything. But she improved my life so much that it was worth the chance.

The seconds ticked by, and she continued to stare at me, just the way my father did when he took his time trying to think of the right words to express his thoughts. “I appreciate your confidence, Derek.”

When my mother had forced Emerson on me, it was such an inconvenience, to have to talk to someone I didn’t know, go into the details of my life, and basically babysit a stranger. But in time, with every task she completed, she made my life more enjoyable, easier to manage, and it was hard to imagine going back to the way it was before, with all my work all over the place, my penthouse dirty, driving to work every day when I could work in the back seat instead. It seemed like I’d lived my life this way forever because it felt so right, and it was easy to forget it hadn’t always been that way. “You’ve earned it.”The guys left, so I was alone in the lab. I worked under the task light, my glasses still on my face, my eyes getting tired from focusing for so many hours straight. Emerson had dropped off lunch earlier, but I hadn’t heard from her since.

The main door opened, and she walked in, carrying boxes of food.

I straightened in the stool and turned to her.

“I know you have better food waiting for you at home, but it’s late and I’m sure you’re hungry.” She took a seat on the stool next to me while I sat at the head of the table. She placed the two containers on the counter along with napkins.

“What is it?” I took one container and opened the lid. “Hamburgers…good choice.”

She smiled. “I’ve been craving them since this morning.” She opened hers and placed a fry in her mouth.

“This is definitely better than whatever the chef made me.” I grabbed the burger and took a big bite as I looked over my work. “I’m glad you haven’t decided to quit on me.”

“Why would I?”

“I saw the look on your face when you looked at that office.”

She chuckled before she grabbed another fry and bit it in half. “It takes a lot more than a dirty office to scare me off…”

“Apparently. How’d it go?”

“I always start a project by throwing away the trash first, napkins, blank pieces of paper, old coffee cups. So I did that first before I started to organize the papers sitting on your desk. If I lived that way, I’d have anxiety all the time, so I don’t know how you do it.”

“I have a good memory, so I know where I put everything.”

“But still…”

I turned back to my work. “I just need to finish something, and then we’ll go.”

“Alright.” She ate her burger as she sat there, eating the whole thing even though she usually had a salad or something light for lunch. But now she ate like she enjoyed every single bite.

I erased a few things before I added my changes. That way, it would be ready for tomorrow.

She watched what I was doing, as if she understood it.

I raised my chin and looked at her.

“I’m sorry. I’m just always fascinated by the stuff you write down. It’s like you’re doing math but with no numbers. You really have to be a genius to understand that.”

“I don’t consider myself to be a genius.”

“Well, if you consider yourself to be average, then what does that make me?”

“I didn’t say I was average.” I lifted my gaze to look at her, to see the drop of ketchup in the corner of her mouth. I didn’t tell her to wipe it away because it was cute…that she had an imperfection when she was perfect all the time. “I just don’t think I deserve the genius title. I think that reputation is reserved for the great minds that have already passed on.”