The Scumbag's Guide To Heroism novel Chapter 382

Chapter 382: 382 | A Hallway Is Not a Public Exhibition Space

Petra came back out with the pen in her hand.

She’d found it in under ninety seconds, which told me everything about how much she’d actually been looking for it. Nobody searches a conference room that fast unless they already know where the thing is, and Petra Lang did not misplace objects. She catalogued her belongings the same way other people breathed.

"Fitzgerald." She stopped four feet away and held the pen up like an exhibit. "I trust the hallway outside the faculty offices is the appropriate venue for whatever this is."

"It’s a hallway," Sloane said. "People stand in hallways."

"People stand. That was not standing."

Sloane’s arm around my waist tightened by about eight percent, which for her was a declaration of war with paperwork already filed. I could feel her building toward something loud through the bond, that specific pressure she got right before she said something she’d regret in twenty minutes and defend for a week.

I put my hand over hers before she launched.

"You’re right," I said to Petra. "Bad optics. Won’t happen outside the faculty building again."

Petra blinked. She’d loaded ammunition for an argument and I’d conceded the point before she got to fire, and I watched her recalibrate in real time, her jaw shifting a fraction as she filed the concession somewhere she hadn’t prepared a folder for.

"Well." She adjusted her grip on the planner. "Naturally. I’m glad one of you understands the concept of institutional visibility."

"He’s not agreeing with you," Sloane said. "He’s managing you. There’s a difference and you’ll figure it out around November."

That landed. Petra’s flush climbed higher on her cheekbones, sitting there against all that porcelain like someone had dropped ink in milk, and for a second the whole imperial composure thing came apart at the seams. Her eyes flicked to me. Then away. Then back, faster than she meant to, and she caught herself doing it and her spine went rigid.

I noticed. I always noticed. That’s the problem with a hundred Intelligence and an interface that flags micro-expressions before my conscious brain finishes rendering the face: I get handed information I’d have been happier not receiving.

The Oracle Feed slid a line across the bottom of my vision.

Petra Lang. Gauge: 14%. Status: Curious. Emotional read: irritated, envious, physically responsive. Note: the envy is not about the position.

I dismissed it. Not because it was wrong. Because it was correct and I had exactly zero available bandwidth for another problem with green eyes and an agency-owning mother.

"Friday," Petra said. "Fourteen hundred. The conference room on the fourth floor, not this one, since apparently this one has become a public exhibition space."

"Fourteen hundred," I agreed.

"Do not be late."

"I’ve never been late."

"You were forty seconds late this afternoon."

"That’s not late. That’s arriving."

Her mouth did something. It wasn’t a smile, exactly, more like the ghost of one that she strangled in the crib, and she turned on her heel and walked away with her heels clicking out a beat that was faster than she’d come in with. She didn’t look back. She wanted to. I watched her not do it, watched the small stiffness in her shoulders holding the impulse down, and I thought about how much easier my life would be if I were slightly stupider.

Sloane exhaled. "God, I hate her."

"You don’t hate her. You hate that she’s competent."

"I can do both." Her fingers slid into the loop of my belt, which was not a hallway gesture. "I’m extremely good at multitasking."

She tugged. "Walk."

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