“We’re containing it,” she corrected.
Rawlings leaned forward, both hands braced on the table now, tension written through his shoulders. “You’re not leaving the building without someone on you.”
I stilled. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me,” he said, his control slipping just enough to show the frustration underneath. “You don’t go anywhere alone. Not until this is handled.”
A short, humorless breath left me. “You’re babysitting me now?”
“If that’s what it takes,” he snapped.
“No,” I said immediately, the word landing harder this time. “Not happening.”
“It’s already happening,” Char cut in. My gaze snapped to her, and this time she held it, completely unbothered by the shift in the room. “Bea stays with you,” she added, nodding once toward the table.
Toward the newcomer.
My attention followed the motion before I could stop it, landing on Bea as she sat there, pen still in her hand, hovering just above the paper like she hadn’t decided what to do with it yet. She hadn’t looked up, but the stillness in her posture gave her away.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I snickered, dragging myfocus back to Char. “You’re assigning me a handler? And a rookie at that.”
“I’m assigning you oversight,” she corrected.
“I don’t need it.”
“That’s not up for debate.” The flippant way Charlotte declared my new status was irksome, to say the least.
Who the fuck do these people think I am?
My jaw tightened, something more territorial settling in under the irritation now. “Absolutely not.”
Rawlings pushed back from the table hard enough that the chair legs scraped against the floor. “You lost the ability to say no the second you landed that punch,” he snapped, the restraint in his voice finally giving way to something closer to anger. “You don’t get to dictate terms here, fuck face.”
I stepped in closer without thinking, the distance between us shrinking into something that wasn’t professional anymore. “Careful,” I growled, a steady warning laced in the syllables. “You don’t get to talk to me like that.”
“Or what?” he shot back, already halfway out of his chair. “You going to take a swing in here too?”
My hands flexed at my sides before I forced them still, the tape pulling across my knuckles as I held the tension there instead of letting it move.
“Enough.” Ezra’s voice cut clean through the room, calm but absolute. He stepped forward, placing himself just enough between us to break the line without making it a show. “Sit down,” he ordered Rawlings, quiet but not optional.
Rawlings held it for a second, chest tight, jaw set, before he dropped back into his chair with a muttered curse, dragging a hand down his face.
Ezra’s attention shifted to me. “And you take a breath.”
I did. Once. Slow. Controlled.
Across the table, movement flickered again. Bea’s penpressed into the page hard enough to crease it before she forced it to move, like stopping completely would draw attention. She still hadn’t looked up, but the tension had reached her anyway. It always did.
Char exhaled slowly, unimpressed. “Can we all put our dicks away and get back to the actual problem?” she stated flatly, her gaze sweeping across the room. “Because this isn’t about ego. It’s about this fucking video mucking up a rebuild season.”
The room reset around her, not completely, but enough.
“We need visibility,” she continued, already moving forward. “Consistency. Something we can manage.”
“You’ve got it,” Rawlings said, his voice still tight. “She stays with him.”
I shook my head. “No.”