Chapter 2
He was six foot three, built with the particular density of someone who had been using his body in difficult places for a long time, and his record was real — every element of the confidence he carried had been earned in circumstances that made most people's understanding of difficulty seem preliminary. He stood over her and said "This isn't a yoga class" with the ease of a man delivering a line that has always worked before.
A ripple of laughter from the operators.
Olivia rose to her feet.
That single movement changed the room because of what it did not contain. There was no hesitation in it, no performance of courage, no announcement of intention. She simply stood, and the standing communicated something that the room received without knowing quite how to name it.
She was nearly a head shorter than him. Lean. Balanced. Her shoulders were relaxed and her arms were loose and her breathing was slow in the way that breathing is slow when a person is not using any energy managing fear. She had not adopted a stance. She was not bouncing. She was simply present, and her presence had a quality to it that was producing the specific discomfort of people watching something they cannot immediately categorize.
Cross closed the distance until his shadow reached her boots.
"You know I could break your arm in three seconds."
Her eyes moved briefly — not to his face, not to his hands. To the space between his feet. Then she looked up.
"You won't get three seconds."
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The sound that followed was not laughter. It was the sharp, involuntary collective intake of a room that has just received information it was not prepared for. Several operators barked something that might have started as a laugh and didn't fully get there. Someone clapped once and stopped. Two hundred men leaned forward simultaneously with the specific posture of people who have realized they are witnessing something that is not going to be brief.
Cross's jaw tightened. His smile left.
