Worth It All(11)

“Who are they?” Casey asked. “How did they get there? Did they use a ladder? Where’s the ladder?”

Paige stepped up to the desk and returned the young woman’s welcoming smile.

“Hi. What’s the name?”

“Casey Roberts. Or Paige. I’m a little late.” And she didn’t know if she was here to see Jake or—

“Yes. I have it right here. We were expecting you.” She clicked the cord hanging from her ear and spoke into a tiny microphone. “Casey Roberts is here. Yes.” She clicked again. “Someone will be right with you. Can I get you some water? Juice?”

“No, thank you. We’re good.” She stepped back and put Casey down, hoping the woman didn’t hear Casey say how much she liked juice.

To her right, the building opened up in a flurry of multilevel activity. Definitely not a doctor’s office feel, more like a state-of-the-art gym gone wild.

“Are we going to see Jake now?”

“I don’t know, and let’s try to keep the questions to a minimum. Okay?”

“Hi. I’m Marcy.”

Paige turned and met a beautiful young girl with black hair and dark eyes. She was tiny and wore a black polo with the Evolution logo and khaki shorts. “Hi. I’m Paige. This is Casey.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Casey.” She shook hands with both of them, using her left hand. “You can see the testing side there.” She pointed. “Lots of fun, but we’re going this way to the R&D offices.”

Marcy led them a few feet to double doors on their left, swiped a card hanging from her neck, and waited for a beep. Casey walked beside her, peeling off questions about what and why and how.

“Lots of security,” Paige said.

“Yes. To protect designs in development.”

“Oh. Right.” Because, like she’d read on Jenny’s smartphone in the two minutes before Casey spilled her cereal, this was cutting-edge. Bionics, neural implants, and a lot of other stuff she didn’t understand.

It took a good five minutes down hallways and up elevators to reach their destination. In that time, she learned Marcy was a talkative intern from South Carolina and that she’d lost her right arm almost to the shoulder when she was four from a lawn-mowing accident.

“Okay, here we are. This is where the main research team works. You’ll be seeing Tyler Davies.”

Oh. Not Jake.

The hallway was wide, floor-to-ceiling white, and so cool it was almost cold. Marcy stopped in the third doorway. “Hey, Tyler.”

A young man with a dark-blond ponytail turned from a table covered in prosthetic feet. He wore a shirt identical to Marcy’s and looked more than happy to stop his work and say hi to her.

“This is Casey,” Marcy said. “She’s here for an adjustment.”

“Oh,” Tyler said, a confused expression on his face. “Mr. McKinney told me an hour ago to work on this. He said he needed it done and to send you down to his office.”

Paige’s heart skipped and her hand tightened on the canvas strap over her shoulder.

“Oh. Okay.” There was a slight hesitation in Marcy’s voice before she bounced back. “Mr. McKinney’s office is all the way down at the end.” Marcy’s voice dropped to almost a whisper.

They passed six or seven more doors until they reached his office. The space was easily six times the size of the bedroom she and Casey shared. Tables lined the walls, all covered in computers, printers, and prosthetic pieces. Many of them looked straight out of a futuristic movie.

Sketches and photographs covered the corkboard wall behind them, and above that was the company’s motto painted in black letters on the white cinder block. Jake sat across the room at one of at least eight computer monitors, his back to them.

Marcy cleared her throat and tapped on the open doorframe. “Mr. McKinney?”

At the sound of his name, Jake stood and walked toward them.

Paige didn’t miss the look of adoration in the young girl’s eyes, which explained the sudden change. Seemed someone had a major crush. Paige didn’t blame her.

Jake definitely had that take-your-breath-away quality. He wore dark jeans and a white collared dress shirt, untucked, with the sleeves rolled halfway up his forearms, and looked even better than he had in a T-shirt.

“Thank you, Marcy.”

Marcy blushed and stared so long Paige considered patting her on the back to make her breathe, but the girl spun on her heel and hurried off.

“Hi, Jake.” Casey walked in, not at all shy. “Is this your work?”

“Yes.”

“This is where you make the stuff?”

A smile played at his lips. “Yes. This is where I make the stuff.”