Trade Me (Cyclone #1)

A few seconds later, her face takes up my watch screen.

“Nobody wants a video app on a goddamned watch.” I hold my wrist in front of my face. “You have to use your wrist to center the camera, and who wants to talk to someone with your arm held awkwardly like this?”

She nods. “Exactly.”

“That’s why,” I say, “Fernanda has six independent cameras in her face, her band, and even the clasp. And they’re not stationary. They swivel, and they sync with the internal gyroscopes to track the user’s movements. On-the-fly interpolation and facial-recognition software means that I can move my arm like this—or like this—” I demonstrate “—and the video on your screen…”

“Tracks your face,” she finishes breathlessly. “That is freaking awesome.”

“Ha,” I say smugly. “I could show you more if we had more people around. We can manage up to five-way video calling—more than that looks terrible on the screen. You’re going to love Fernanda. And if there’s anything you don’t love about her, tell us and we’ll see if we can fix it.”

She nods.

“The video angle can sometimes still be awkward, depending on how you’re waving your hand, but you get used to the reasonable range of motion really quickly.”

Our eyes meet. We’re twenty feet away. Still, my chest feels tight. I’m not pretending. If my father is watching the way I’m looking at her now, he will never guess the truth.

Hell. I’m standing in the hall in front of the office that used to belong to Peter, and I’m still smiling.

I’m not sure I can tell that we’re not together, and I’m in on the secret.

TINA

The bridge over the Bay crosses dull, gray water. The sun is low in the sky; Blake’s car is freakishly silent, gliding along with only the whisper of tires against road. I can’t get used to how quiet his car is.

I’m trying to sort myself back into place. No more pretending. No more touching. No more acting. We got what we wanted, right?

I can’t make out anything about him. I had assumed he didn’t get along with his father; instead, they seemed to be genuinely friendly. He said he wanted to get away from Cyclone, but when he put Fernanda on my wrist, his eyes sparkled with real pride.

He told his dad he was planning on marrying me, but we spoke for the first time five days ago. I don’t know who he is or what he’s doing. I do know that today—that flirtation, those tiny touches we exchanged—came a little too easily to me.

“You said you wanted to get away from Cyclone,” I finally say. “It doesn’t look like it to me.”

“I didn’t quite say that.” He speaks so calmly, as if this afternoon—an afternoon where his father offered me a massive sum of money, and where we flirted over legal paperwork—makes sense. “I said I needed to get away.”

“What would you do if you left for good?”

“Run, apparently.” There’s a dry quality to his tone. “When I don’t feel like running anymore, I’ll go back.”

I shake my head. “I swear to God. I am never going to understand people with money.”

His fingers trace the steering wheel up and down. “That’s not money,” he finally says. “Money has nothing to do with it. Haven’t you ever loved something you hated? Or hated something you loved?”

My mind goes instantly to my mother. I love her; I do. She’s a fierce ball of need—always looking after everyone but herself and her own.

“Maybe.” I don’t want to look at him. I don’t want to feel more of a connection.

“Then you understand how I feel about Cyclone. I love interface design. If I do it well, a million people will never know how happy I’ve made them, not until they try a competitor’s product. I have to pay attention to things people don’t even know they want. I have a real gift for that.”

He’s stating this as a fact—and having his brainchild on my wrist now, I can’t disagree.

“It’s the other bullshit I can’t handle.”

I think I had a taste of that other bullshit this afternoon.

The rest of the bridge goes by in silence. He turns north, and the last of the sun spills over the windshield.

“I don’t understand what I’m doing here,” I finally say. “Are you really that good a liar, that you can tell your dad that…that thing you did without even blinking?” I still can’t make myself repeat what he said aloud.

“I said what I had to in order to get you Fernanda.” His jaw sets. “You can’t plan the launch without her. It was necessary. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you it was coming, but I didn’t trust your acting skills, and I thought your honest reaction would be more convincing.”

“It’s fine. It’s just that your acting skills are ridiculous.”

“You’ve seen the commercials?” It’s not quite a question, the way he asks it.

I don’t want to admit that I’ve watched the entire YouTube playlist at this point. “Some of them,” I lie.