Loathe at First Sight - Suzanne Park Page 0,47

He just looked feverishly sick. Goddamn pukey poker face, masking all emotions.

“Yes, you.” I needed to know if he leaked the news of my game to BetaGank and left me out to hang.

“You want the truth?” He took his hands off his keyboard and put them in his lap. “I was glad to see that info get leaked. Because I didn’t think you deserved that job. I’d been here way longer than you and they didn’t even consider me for the lead production position. And you waltzed in here and got to work on a big title. Fuck the board of directors. Yeah, the fact that BetaGank called you out made me happy. But don’t look at me when you’re looking for someone to blame. It wasn’t me.”

His voice softened a little. “Honestly, I didn’t expect such a fucking shitstorm to come of it, though. It’s all pretty fucked up right now.”

He propped his elbows on his desk and placed his chin on his interlocked fingers, like a pedestal. His open body language made me believe he was telling the truth. But I couldn’t read him. Could I trust Asher? If he was being truthful and he didn’t leak the insider information, then who did?

I chose my next words carefully. “Thanks for being so candid. I’m sorry you felt that way about my involvement in production. I was the creator of the game, though, remember that? I’m taking my idea to completion, it’s as simple as that. There wasn’t any plan to steal a lead production job from underneath you, just so you know. It just sorta . . . happened. But I’m a quick learner and a damn good project manager.” He stayed in his pedestal position, so I went on. “I know we got off on the wrong foot. And by that, I mean we just hate each other. I’ll go ahead and say it.”

He sniggered. “Yeah, I guess the feeling is mutual.”

“Well, the good news is we definitely have something in common. Our mutual dislike.” He and I laughed. “I need your help, though, Asher. We need this game to be a success. The company does for sure, and Kat and I have a lot at stake here. Can I please count on you?”

Could flat-out asking for his support backfire on me? With zero leverage, I couldn’t even give him a freebie sick day. This all hinged on whether he would be okay with doing the right thing for the sake of doing the right thing. I’d be willing to set aside our differences if we could work this out.

He snorted out his nose. Was that a sarcastic snort? Goddamn Asher poker face.

Then, he sighed deeply. “Look, I get it. And as much as we can’t stand each other, I don’t want this game to fail because a bunch of misogynistic assholes brought it down for the wrong reasons. I have twin sisters who are seniors in high school, and well, all that loathing these fuckers are spewing out online for the entire world to see isn’t okay. So count me in on your crusade. But with some conditions. I want to be the game spokesperson and handle the media interviews. I think you’d be bad at that.”

He was right. The second I flubbed up an interview, the trolls would skewer me for it. And if Asher could take that responsibility from me, no problem.

He added, “AND . . . you need to convince Jane and Sean not to make us dance together at their wedding. Because I hate dancing, and it would just be weird, us twirling around with fake smiles on our faces when we can barely stand each other.”

Yes. He was right about that, too. Another good idea.

“I’ll do my best. I’ll even give you a sort-of sick day today. Just work from home, and if anyone looks for you, I’ll tell them you looked like you were dying. Sound good?”

He gave me a weak smile, and his puke-colored face lit up as much as it could. He took only a nanosecond to undock his laptop, shove it into his backpack, and rush out the door. His chair spun for a solid ten seconds after he ran out the door. I went to the conference room anyway so I wouldn’t inhale more of his germs.

I’d just made a deal with a demi-devil. You’re welcome, bro.

As I plowed through my email backlog, a new email alert from Nolan came through. Instead of a friendly hello,

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