Nothing Personal by Rosalind James

diner, but not my last. I worked there all through college, with my grandma. And I’m not sorry. I’m glad.” Her low voice had lost its usual softness, and her eyes were blazing. “Because you know what? I know things that lots of so-called successful people have never learned. I know how to work really hard. I know that low-paying jobs are usually tougher and more stressful and a whole lot less enjoyable than high-paying ones. And I know that if hard work was all it took to make it, this country would be run by people who take care of kids and clean houses and mow lawns. And so should you.”
    “ I do know that, because I was raised right, just like you,” he assured her. “Poor, but right. Don’t worry. All appearances to the contrary, I know all that too.”
     

Life on the Cube Farm
    “Yeah, I did s ome good work with Ethan. Their code was spaghetti when I got there, but I sorted it out. Visicon was pretty chill, but the challenge is over now. Ready to move on.”
    T he young man leaned back in the leather chair that had been delivered just yesterday, Rae having decided that furnishing the conference room was top priority for exactly this reason. The kid’s jeans were appropriately skinny, the designer jacket over the black T-shirt clearly carefully chosen for its panache. Alec knew that none of these guys wore a tie anymore—hell, he never did either, not unless it was absolutely necessary—but he’d wondered, when he’d seen the retro black high-tops with their white rubber caps, if they hadn’t gone a little far down the road. He was less than ten years older than—Simon, he thought with a glance down at the resume in front of him, but he wouldn’t have worn jeans to an interview. Or tennis shoes.
    Still, Ethan said the guy could write code, and Ethan was a friend of Joe’s, so who cared if the kid was a little cocky? Alec had been accused of that often enough himself, and they weren’t hiring Simon for his personality. But Joe could finish interviewing him. Because the whine of electric drills and the thump of partitions being wrestled into place that had provided an unmelodious background to their afternoon had suddenly died down considerably, and he should probably check on that.
    “Excuse me.” He got up from the conference table, stepped out into the hive of activity that was their formerly-open office space, and pulled the door shut behind him. One team was industriously setting up panels for what would become their cube farm, but the other was standing idle. With Rae.
    “ This needs to be taken apart and redone,” she was saying. “I believe I mentioned that you should double-check with the diagram as you go.”
    S he was standing tall, her gaze steady and serious on the big bearded guy in the orange T-shirt, dusty jeans, and work boots, a kidney belt beneath his pot belly, who was hefting his drill, clearly impatient to get on with it.
    “I have an extra copy here , since you seem to have mislaid yours.” She held the sheet out to the guy, who made no move to take it.
    “ Twenty units,” he said. “Five blocks of four. I do this all the time, lady. Go on back to your office and let us do the job. Piece of cake.”
    “ Not if the electrical fittings are in the wrong place.” She crouched under the unit he’d just finished installing with his helper, who was standing by, a bemused expression on his face. She got onto all fours, crawled under the desk space, and poked at the fitting. “See that? Wrong orientation.”
    The guy was looking, Alec saw. He was looking at Rae’s ass , exchanging a grin with his helper, and Alec was at his side in a few quick strides.
    “Problem here?” he asked.
    “I don’t have a problem,” Beard Boy said, glancing at him, then back down at Rae’s rear view. “I’m having a real good time.”
    “Well, unless you want this to be your last day on the job,” Alec said as Rae climbed out again, dusting off the knees of her pants, “you’ll do