The memory of Ryan standing over her, his calloused hand tilting her jaw upward, still burned a phantom heat into her skin.
Her pulse beat a rapid, erratic rhythm against her throat.
Ryan didn't sit down.
He stood behind his desk, his suit jacket discarded on the leather chair, his sleeves rolled up to the elbows. He projected a heavy, suffocating gravity that seemed to physically press the oxygen out of the room.
"Sit," Ryan said.
Iralis swallowed hard. She moved rigidly to the guest chair and sat down, placing her laptop on the polished wood.
She didn't open it. She kept her hands folded tightly in her lap.
"The beta servers are stable," Iralis began, her voice a thin, clinical wire trying desperately not to snap. "The active user count crossed six thousand this morning. The data architecture is—"
"This isn't about Bridge," Ryan interrupted softly.
He walked around the edge of the desk. Iralis's spine locked.
