The first text arrived at half past four.
Dinner tonight. Been a while since we celebrated properly.
She read it at her desk and thought: dinner. Straightforward enough. She typed back: Where?
His reply came in under a minute. An address she recognized before she'd finished reading it.
Le Cirque.
She sat with that for a moment.
Le Cirque—the restaurant where they'd had their first dinner. Where she'd worn the red dress and engineered the entire evening with the specific precision of a woman who had spent weeks preparing to make a man talk. Where he'd looked at her across the table with the careful attention of someone who already suspected he was being managed and had decided, for reasons she hadn't fully understood then, to speak up anyway.
She typed back: So. A date?
Three dots. Then: You caught me. But it's been a long time since we had a proper dinner. The broadband contract deserves a celebration. Come.
She looked at the message.
Then she typed: Fine. I'll be there.
