Chapter 5: Impersonation
Shortly after dinner, Ed and I found ourselves going round in circles again—but this time on a different matter.
"You'll need to talk to Lacey first," I said. "Anything you reveal in a tell-all interview has to be approved by her."
"She won't agree to it."
"Won't she? She seems pretty forthcoming on social media."
Ed leaned back into the sofa, stretching his arms out over the cushions as he surveyed his notes.
"That's based on speculation only. Officially confirming something is a different kettle of fish. Her team will veto it."
"Well, if her team's involved, ours needs to be, too," I said.
Shaking his head, he scraped a hand over his jaw. "No. If we tell Helen, Mark will find out."
"But we can't go behind Lacey's back. It's not fair on her."
"I can tell them bits, but not everything," he said. "It will seem like a tell-all to the journalist, but we'll know it's not."
I drummed my pen against my notebook. "Okay, but those bits still need to be approved by Lacey. We can't go completely rogue on this."
Ed groaned and rose from the sofa, beginning to pace back and forth as he wrung his hands together in front of his stomach.
"Maybe it's simpler to pay-off."
I lifted a shoulder to shrug. "Fine. But, again, that will go through Helen."
"Not if we do it privately."
This time I couldn't hold back my scoff of astonishment, my eyes widening as I gaped at his pacing figure.
"I'm going to pretend you didn't say that."
"Yeah. Fair enough."
Stopping by the window, Ed leaned his shoulder against the glass and stared down at the bright lights illuminating the dark city. A hand ran absentmindedly through his hair, a sign of stress that I'd come to recognise.
"Let's call it a night," I said.
"I at least want a plan," he said, turning to face me and leaning back against the glass, "so tonight hasn't been a waste of time."
Given that he was stressed, I swallowed down my defensive retort.
"You need to talk to Lacey before we go any further with this. If she's not on board, the whole thing's a non-starter."
"Right," he said with a complete lack of conviction. "And the journalist?"
"She's good. As far as she's aware, we can't get hold of you to corroborate the story. I may have suggested that your disappearing act could add flavour to her piece if true."
Ed nodded, swiping his tongue over his bottom lip. "And the girl?"
"The journalist is buying time by saying she's negotiating payment with her boss. Relax, it's all in hand."
"Okay. Thanks, Soph..."
I began to pack away my things, very aware of the pair of eyes burning into my skull. But when I turned to say bye, worry etched lines into his face. They faded into a relaxed smile, but it was too late. I'd caught him.
"Want to talk about it?" I offered, hand poised over my bag as I waited to see whether he needed me to stick around.
Shaking his head, Ed perched on the edge of the mattress, kicking off his shoes.
"Nah. Just want to sleep."
"Sure?"
"Let's not go there, Soph. It's been a long day, and my head can't handle any blurred lines right now."
If I needed further proof that the incident in the kitchen symbolised nothing more than a fulfilment of urges, this was it. Ed kept the lines so clear cut between us.
Something continued to play on my mind, though. A niggle. A guilt. Yes, the lines were clear, but that didn't mean emotions had stopped existing. It just meant that we'd put boundaries in place to stop either one of us getting hurt.
"We said we'd always be honest with each other," I said. "But I still didn't mean to blurt out that I'd slept with Mac. I'm sorry for—"
"It's none of my business."
Except it sort of was his business, because while Ed and I had agreed on emotional distance, my conscience wouldn't let me fool around with him if I was also hooking up with someone else. There was a difference between meaningless one-night stands with strangers and regular sex with a friend.
"It didn't mean anything," I said, tightening my fingers around the strap of my bag as I pressed on against my better judgement. "He's a friend, but I—"
"We're not together and we agreed we could see other people. You don't need to justify it."
His firm words cut through my feeble attempt at reassurance. There was no resentment in them but no warmth, either. Just cold, hard facts. Poker face. I fucking hated his poker face.
Or maybe he really didn't care that I'd slept with Mac. He was well aware of my nocturnal activities, and perhaps he'd become immune to the jealousy it had stirred when he'd first caught me sneaking back into the hotel two months ago.
But on the off chance that he did care, and he was just pretending not to, I gave it one last shot.
"I know, but I thought you'd want to know that—"
"I don't want to know, okay?" Irritated eyes fired sparks of frustration across the room at me. His fist clenched into a ball at his side, his shoulders locking as he stared at my hovering figure.
Then he pried his gaze away from me and bowed his head with a resigned sigh.
"Sorry," he said gently, pinching his eyes shut. "I didn't mean to snap. I'm tired, and I can't get into this with you right now."
"I'm not trying to change anything between us, Ed. I know the deal. I was actually trying to reassure you that nothing has changed. Just in case it was on your mind among everything else that's stressing you out right now."
He didn't reply, busying himself with removing his watch, his bracelet, his belt.
"All right," I said, the message loud and clear. "Well, if you ever need a professional shoulder to lean on, you know where I am."
His eyes flicked up, and the corner of his mouth quirked into the tiniest of appreciative smiles as I pulled my bag onto my arm.
During the walk back to my room, my mind ran over our plan a hundred times. I should have had faith in it, but I didn't. Although it was doomed to fail, I had to back him on it.
Ed and I might not have the simplest of relationships, but there was no ambiguity in our agreement: we had each other's backs no matter what.
*
On Friday, Ed slipped off the grid—a feat that should have been hard and yet he'd managed it twice in as many weeks.
Despite Helen doing her damnedest to pretend like this wasn't a big deal, the pink flush in her cheeks and raised pitch of her voice told a different story. She'd summoned me to her office and paced back and forth behind her desk as I watched her from the seat across.
"I don't know what's got into him recently. He used to tell me everything, but ever since you fell into his life, he's been a different person."
Her voice bore no hostility—just concern—so I resisted the temptation to point out that my involvement in his life had been initially orchestrated by her. At least I couldn't be blamed for his latest disappearing act, considering that I was sat in her office right now.
"He doesn't tell you everything, Helen," I said, "but you should take that as a good thing. It shows it's nothing to do with you or me."
Sighing, she sank into her chair, slinging one leg over the other as she rocked back into the seat. Calculative eyes landed on me.
"You sure you don't know where he is, Sophia?"
"Absolutely positive. We don't have a relationship outside work."
Her eyes rolled back into her head, deliberately dramatic.
"Please. Lie to me if you have to, but at least don't treat me like an idiot."
Pressing my lips together, I stayed silent and waited for the next question. If Ed had given me the heads up, this would be a different conversation. But he hadn't. I was just as clueless as Helen, and my insistence that I didn't know his whereabouts was the truth, not a cover-up.
Knuckles rapped softly against the door before it swung open. Into the room strolled Mark—or at least a version of him. Dressed in dark jeans and a white polo shirt, he almost looked ordinary.
My lips twitched as I dragged my gaze over his casual attire, but the subtle narrowing of his eyes wiped the smile off my face.
"Sorry to pull you in on your day off, Mark." Helen heaved out a sigh as she stood up again, resuming the pacing.
"No problem. If one of my men has messed up, I want to know about it."
If we'd been alone in the room, I might have commented that the ship wasn't as tight without its captain, but Helen did not appear to be in the mood for jokes, and apparently I was the only one not concerned about Ed going AWOL.
Then again, they didn't know he'd already done it once before and had probably got a taste for it.
"Unfortunately Sophia isn't able to shed any light on the situation." A flash of annoyance flickered through Helen's eyes as she glanced across at me.
Mark folded his arms, wetting his lips as he scanned my sitting figure. Unlike my appraisal of him—entirely appreciative—he looked at me with an assessing gaze, as if the lies might have been tattooed onto my body.
"That doesn't surprise me," he said.
I waited for him to elaborate, to clarify his statement, but he left it there. Clearing my throat, I sat up straighter in my chair.
"Great. So can I go?" I asked.
"Do we need to be worried?" Helen asked me. "From a professional standpoint."
"If he was doing something that would make my job more difficult, you can be sure that I'd tell him about that."
"Tell him, then." Mark jerked his chin at me. "Take out your phone and send him a message."
Two pairs of eyes burned into me, and I suspected I wouldn't be released from the room until they were certain I wasn't covering for him. Determined not to waver under the pressure, I reached into my bag for my phone and opened up my last conversation with Ed.
Me: Can you let me know all is okay? Mark and Helen are stressing. They assume I know where you are, and I have better things to be doing with my time than trying to convince them otherwise
"There." I spun the phone around to show them both that I'd sent a message. "Now, are we all going to sit here and wait for him to reply, or can I—?"
"No." Mark reached over and swiped the phone from my hand. "We're not going to wait. We're going to speed up the process."
He tapped out one word, and then the swooshing sound echoed around the silent room. Before I could ask what he'd done, my phone pinged, and Mark's lips twitched with satisfaction.
"Apparently we're good," he said to Helen whilst holding out the phone to me. "But I'll be having words when I see him."
I snatched it from him and peered down at the screen, my stomach clenching when I saw what Mark had sent, and then filling with nausea when I glanced at the previous messages we'd exchanged. Messages that Mark had now seen.
Had Ed let Mark in on our arrangement? I knew they were close, but I'd always assumed their bond remained firmly in the realms of professionalism without venturing into friendship. Still, however he knew, it was a dirty trick and snapped my last thread of patience.
"So can I go now?" I repeated, already rising from my chair.
"Keep us updated, please," Mark said to me.
I lifted my eyes to his and skewered him with a glare. "Why don't you just keep hold of my phone and have the conversation for me?"
"Enough," Helen snapped. "Thank you, Sophia. Enjoy your weekend."
As I left the room, I couldn't decide whether my anger was better directed at Ed's disappearing act or Mark's sly impersonation of me. Given that only one of them was in the building to offload onto, I settled on Mark.
He didn't seem surprised when he slipped out of Helen's office minutes later and found me leaning against the wall opposite.
"Sophia," he said, nodding curtly at me as he shut the door and took off down the corridor.
I pushed off the wall and scurried after him, my hand instinctively reaching out to clasp his forearm. Although Ed had the physique of a model, Mark was built like a bodybuilder. My fingers barely came halfway around the muscle of his lower arm, and yet he immediately stopped, gently pulling out of my grasp and turning to face me.
"What is it?" he asked, the tiniest hint of irritation present in his robotic voice.
"Don't give me that. You know exactly why I'm pissed."
With a sigh, Mark folded his arms and peered down at me. "Whatever arrangement the two of you have is between you. But you are part of this team, and you need to act like it."
A blast of resentment stormed through my body. We'd made our arrangement because I was part of his team. I didn't need reminding of that; I thought about it every time I ogled his perfect body, laughed at his stupid jokes, and replayed the dirtier memories of Europe when alone in bed at night.
But Mark had always seen things in black and white—and he'd never been a huge fan of Ed and me together, either.
I glanced down the corridor, noticing how the men in his team stared straight ahead with no acknowledgement of our presence. As much as I didn't want to be dressed down by their boss in front of them, I also knew Mark wouldn't want to cause a scene.
"I don't know where he is," I said, lowering my voice. "And I actually think you should be the one in the hot seat—not me. It's your team who's supposed to keep tabs on him."
The lack of reaction to my accusation only infuriated me more. How many years had it taken to perfect that? Was he really dead inside or did he just switch off whenever I spoke to him?
I knew he was capable of sensitivity because I'd witnessed it myself, but I had a brew of frustration and anger bubbling within my blood, and it edged closer and closer to boiling point with no avenue for release.
"Are you done?" he asked me. "It's supposed to be my day off."
"Just don't try to impersonate me again," I said. "It's not fair. On me or Ed."
Rather than acknowledge that, Mark held my gaze for a few seconds before abruptly turning to continue along the corridor. He reached halfway down before pausing and twisting back to face me, taking a few steps closer.
"What's your calendar like on Monday?" he asked.
"Why?"
"Because you've been in this role for three months now, and you've been in Ed's life longer than that, but apparently you still don't have a clear understanding of how this works. Let's put in a meeting and I'll fill in the gaps. Okay?"
No. Not okay. I wasn't a child. I knew exactly how it all worked, but I refused to behave like a puppet when that wasn't in Ed's best interests.
Resting my shoulder against the wall, I folded my arms and made a point of raking my eyes down his body again. Checking him out in Helen's office had scored a tiny reaction, so maybe that was the way to go.
"Are you a good teacher?" I tilted my head to the side with a playful smile.
"You need to take it seriously, Sophia."
"Don't treat me like a child, then."
He took the tiniest step towards me before thinking better of it and pausing. So close. I was one carefully executed line away from breaking him.
"If you don't want to be treated like a child, you need to start acting like an adult." Coated in a warning message, the words drifted from his mouth slowly and clearly.
"Or maybe you need to start trusting me." I shrugged.
I'd set him up perfectly, yet he still failed to react. He wasn't even on duty. Instead, he nodded and then turned away, continuing down the corridor without looking back at me.
Trust. It always boiled down to trust. And nobody in this team would ever fully trust me—I'd made sure of that.
***
Thank you for reading :) xx
***
Got some fun scenes with Mark coming up. I know fun + Mark don't usually go together, but they were entertaining to write, and I hope you enjoy reading them too.
Back to current events, though -- where do you think Ed has disappeared off to this time? And why?