Run, Girl (If You Can)

Kyle continued showing Jeremy the ropes until lunchtime, when he led him to the cafeteria. Roger came along with them. They got their trays—they were serving Mexican food today—and sat down together at a table.

A deceptively youthful man with red hair plunked his tray down next to Roger. "What is up my dudes? Cam ditched me for a business lunch with a potential investor so here I am."

"We're eating with the new guy," he replied. "Introduce yourself, kid."

Jeremy was a bit stunned by this overly casual man who had joined them. It took him a moment to snap out of it.

"Jeremy Ward, nice to meet you."

The other man raised an eyebrow. "You're Jeremy Ward? Interesting. Nice to meet you too; I'm Aiden Quinn."

This guy was one of Aaron Hale's closest associates? Seriously?! He didn't look a day over thirty. How old was he, anyway?

Aiden ignored the fact that Jeremy was having an internal meltdown and began talking about how his son's robotics competition conflicted with his daughter's dance recital so he and his wife had to each take one. He lamented that the both children had been offended that the other parents couldn't make it.

He didn't look nearly old enough to have children in the upper grades of elementary school. Jeremy supposed that baby faces never truly went away even if some wrinkles did appear. It was a bit disconcerting to say the least.

The fact that he spoke like a surfer from California didn't help his image at all. How on earth had such a man ended up in Aaron Hale's pocket?

Kyle answered that for him as they parted ways with Aiden at the end of lunch.

"Don't mind him; he's been like that for as long as I've known him. The first time I saw him refer to Aaron as 'boss man' unironically I nearly had a heart attack. He still does it. Apparently they've known each other the longest out of anyone here."

Interesting. Very interesting. Jeremy had only been here a day and he understood even less about his idol's character than he had before.

As they were walking back to the analyst department, they got into the elevator. A very powerful presence was already inside, emitting so much ice that he nearly froze solid.

The man inside was wearing what appeared to be a very expensive blue suit and was talking on the phone. He gave Kyle and Roger a subtle nod to acknowledge their presence before continuing his conversation.

Jeremy couldn't quite catch everything since he could only hear one side of the conversation but it appeared that the person on the other end was in trouble for screwing something up. He pitied the poor fool that crossed this kingly presence.

He couldn't believe he was in the same elevator as Aaron Hale. The Aaron Hale! The man he had done his best to pattern his life after!

But he couldn't speak. He felt like a bug under a microscope even though Aaron wasn't looking at him. Tiny and insignificant.

Aaron was everything Jeremy had ever imagined and more. He couldn't breathe properly again until they exited the elevator on their floor.

"Everyone has that reaction at first," Roger said sympathetically. "Don't worry; he won't eat you."

Jeremy firmly resolved right then to never, ever upset that man. He didn't want to be like whoever was on the other end of that phone call. His idol was a terrifying sight to behold.

===

Aaron was on the phone with Kaleb, who had burned through his monthly allowance trying to impress a girl and wanted more to go to the movies, when he got back to the office. He was not happy.

The kid was a freshman at Florida State University and had been specifically recruited to play baseball. What on earth was he thinking? Violet, who was enrolled in Columbia's dance program, stuck to her usual pattern of studiousness and moderation. She never caused these kinds of problems.

Keeley didn't want their kids to be too spoiled despite their father's vast fortune. The younger kids got $200 but the twins were graduated so she let them have $500 to go have fun with, on top of living expenses. Kaleb had a little too much fun showering a girl he was trying to impress with presents.

This was what he got for having so many kids. Of course one of them would end up with a big head because their dad was a billionaire.

Violet was a simple person who saved most of her allowance. Oliver blew his all on Lego sets and parts to build more robots but at least he knew not to ask for more. Nathan used his money on exotic cooking ingredients, oddly enough.

He was a sweetheart whose primary interests were animals and cooking. He was actually pretty good too.

Nathan took over cooking duty from his mother most nights because he wanted to experiment with new dishes. He had been like this ever since Keeley took off work to go to his parent-teacher conference and they ended up watching the Food Network together afterwards.

Aaron had been so put off by his phone call that he didn't get the chance to introduce himself to Jeremy for the first time in this life. He barely managed to nod at the people in the elevator with him. His former protégé probably didn't realize he had been included in that nod.

He seemed a bit awestruck, which was strange. He hadn't been like that the first time they met. But the circumstances had changed. Jeremy was twenty-six when they originally met; right now he was only twenty-one and fresh out of college.

It wasn't so far-fetched to think that a younger version of the man would behave a little differently. People did change as they aged. Goodness knows Aiden had been completely different the two times Aaron met him.

Jeremy was probably confused about why he had been headhunted. It was unfortunate that Aaron couldn't simply say that he already knew the kid's capabilities because they had worked together for so long before.

There had to be some way he could introduce himself that wouldn't be totally weird. After all, he was the CEO. CEOs didn't just introduce themselves to new people working in a random department.

But he hadn't been able to resist bringing Jeremy onboard sooner than in his last life. With him in Aaron's corner, they would be able to improve the company's ongoing expansion plan faster than in his first life. The kid was a genius with numbers.

Putting that aside, he also wanted to see how his old partner was doing. They hadn't seen each other for nearly thirty years, after all. Not that much could have changed about Jeremy from one life to the next, right?