Pattern Recognition
Chapter One — New Recruit
Post-RE9 | Grace Ashcroft x Fem!Reader | Slow Burn | Workplace Tension Reader POV primarily.
After the events of Raccoon City and the discovery of Elpis, Grace Ashcroft is trying to rebuild a life she never expected to have. Between raising Emily, navigating her new confidence, and settling back into her role as an FBI intelligence analyst, she's finally learning what "normal" is supposed to look like.
Then a new analyst joins her department.
A former military recruit with a sharp eye, a dry sense of humour, and an irritating habit of noticing things Grace would rather keep hidden.
What begins as training a new colleague slowly becomes something far more dangerous.
Late nights in the office. Shared coffee. Rain-soaked commutes. Text messages that drift beyond work. And a growing connection neither of them seems capable of stopping.
As old wounds heal and new feelings emerge, Grace finds herself facing a challenge far more terrifying than any bioweapon conspiracy:
Letting someone get close.
A slow-burn sapphic romance filled with yearning, workplace tension, emotional healing, found family, rainy evenings, and the quiet realization that sometimes the people who matter most arrive when you least expect them.
--------------------
The FBI Midwest office was quieter than you expected.
Not silent. Never silent. There was always the low hum of overhead lights, the distant ring of a phone, the soft clatter of keyboards from people who looked like they hadn’t seen sunlight in days. But it wasn’t the kind of noise you were used to.
No shouting across concrete barracks. No boots on metal stairs. No clipped commands over comms.
Just coffee, paper, monitors, and exhaustion dressed up as professionalism.
You adjusted the strap of your bag against your shoulder and followed the hallway signs toward Analyst Division.
First day.
New department.
New title.
Former military. New recruit. Intelligence analyst.
The words still felt strange when attached to you.
You’d spent years being trained to move, react, assess, survive. Now you were meant to sit behind a desk and find threats before they grew teeth.
Apparently, that was the safer option.
You weren’t convinced.
A man in a loosened tie passed you with a half-empty mug and gave you a quick once-over.
“Transfer?”
You nodded.
“Analyst division.”
He gave you a look of sympathy so immediate it almost made you laugh.
“Condolences.”
“Promising start.”
“Dempsy’s office. End of the hall.”
You thanked him and carried on.
Halfway down the corridor, you heard a voice.
Soft.
Flustered.
A little breathless.
“N-no, that’s not— wait, sorry, j-just give me one second.”
Your eyes moved automatically toward the nearest open office.
One desk. Three monitors. Too many case files. A stack of folders balanced dangerously close to the edge. Sticky notes scattered across the partition walls in a system that looked chaotic at first glance, but probably made perfect sense to whoever had built it.
And sitting in the middle of it was a woman.
Blonde hair. Glasses. Dark blazer slightly too big at the shoulders. FBI badge clipped neatly to her lapel.
She had one hand pressed to her headset while the other moved rapidly across her keyboard, her eyes darting between two monitors with a kind of focused panic that should not have been as compelling as it was.
“I d-did send the revised packet,” she said. “It should be under appendix B.”
A pause.
Her face changed.
Just slightly.
The sort of tiny expression most people would miss.
You didn’t.
“Oh.”
Another pause.
She pushed her glasses higher up her nose with the back of her wrist.
“T-that’s appendix C. Sorry. M-my mistake.”
Something warm and completely inconvenient stirred low in your chest.
Oh no.
That was your first coherent thought about Grace Ashcroft.
Not her name. You didn’t know that yet.
Just—
Oh no.
Because she was pretty.
Not in a polished, untouchable way. Not in the way people sometimes tried to be pretty.
She was pretty like an interrupted thought. Like cold coffee forgotten beside classified documents. Like someone who had been running on three hours of sleep and sheer intelligence for far too long.
She was pretty in a way that made you want to know what made her laugh.
That was significantly more dangerous than anything you had signed up for.
You should have kept walking.
Instead, you slowed.
The woman closed her eyes for half a second, visibly gathering herself.
“R-right. Give me five minutes. I’ll resend it.”
She ended the call and immediately buried her face in one hand.
You bit back a smile.
Then a door opened beside you.
“You’re late.”
You turned.
Nathan Dempsy stood in his doorway, broad-shouldered and tired-eyed, holding a file you assumed had your entire professional life inside it.
“I’m early,” you said.
“You’re military. Same thing.”
You smiled.
He didn’t.
Tough room.
Dempsy nodded once toward his office. You stepped inside.
The meeting was exactly what you expected. Paperwork. Transfer details. A brief overview of department structure. A professional acknowledgment of your military background that carefully avoided asking anything too personal.
You appreciated that.
You’d had enough interviews where people looked at your service record like they were trying to find the damage.
Dempsy closed your file after several minutes and leaned back in his chair.
“You’ll be shadowing Ashcroft.”
Your attention sharpened.
“Ashcroft?”
He pointed vaguely through the glass wall.
You followed the gesture.
Blonde hair. Glasses. Chaos desk.
Phone disaster.
Ah.
Her.
“You’ll be assigned directly under her until you’re cleared to handle casework independently,” Dempsy said.
You looked back at him.
“She’s senior?”
“One of the best technical analysts in this office.”
You glanced through the glass again.
Grace Ashcroft was currently staring at her printer like it had personally betrayed her.
“She looks terrified of office equipment.”
“She is.”
You laughed before you could stop yourself.
Dempsy’s expression did not change.
“She’s also brilliant. Don’t underestimate her.”
“I wasn’t.”
That was true.
You already knew enough to tell the difference between incompetence and overworked genius.
Grace Ashcroft was definitely the second.
Dempsy studied you for a moment, then sighed through his nose.
“And don’t flirt with her.”
You blinked.
“I’m sorry?”
“Preventative warning.”
“I haven’t even met her.”
“I’ve worked this job long enough to recognise a problem before it hits my desk.”
You leaned back slightly, amused despite yourself.
“You give every recruit this warning?”
“No.”
“Interesting.”
“Don’t make it interesting.”
You held up both hands.
“Professional. Got it.”
Dempsy looked unconvinced.
Fair.
A minute later, he led you out into the bullpen.
The closer you got to Grace’s desk, the more you noticed.
Her coffee was untouched and definitely cold. A pen rested behind one ear, though she seemed unaware of it. Her desk was cluttered, but not messy. Everything had a place, even if that place looked insane to anyone else.
There was a framed photo near her monitor.
A younger girl beside her.
Both smiling.
Grace’s smile in the picture was small but real, like it had been coaxed out of her carefully.
Something in your chest softened before you could stop it.
“Ashcroft,” Dempsy said.
Grace startled.
Not dramatically. Just enough for her shoulders to lift and her hand to knock against a folder.
Several papers slid onto the floor.
“Oh— d-damn it.”
She crouched quickly to gather them.
You stepped forward on instinct and picked up a page near your boot.
Grace looked up.
For half a second, your eyes met.
Grayish-blue.
Tired.
Alert.
Beautiful.
Definitely a problem.
You handed her the page.
She took it carefully, her fingers brushing yours for the briefest moment.
Nothing dramatic.
Nothing meaningful.
Just skin against skin.
Still, her gaze flicked down.
Then away.
“Th-thanks.”
“Anytime.”
Dempsy cleared his throat.
You forced your attention back to something other than Grace’s hand.
“Ashcroft, this is your recruit.”
Grace straightened, clutching the recovered papers to her chest.
“My…?”
“Recruit.”
Grace’s eyes widened slightly.
“I thought you were j-joking.”
“I don’t joke about staffing.”
“You j-joke about budget meetings.”
“That’s despair.”
You pressed your lips together to hide a smile.
Grace noticed.
Her cheeks coloured faintly.
God.
This was going to be awful.
Dempsy gestured toward you.
“Former military. Analyst transfer. Same clearance path as discussed.”
Grace looked at you again.
You gave her an easy smile.
“Hi.”
She hesitated.
Not cold.
Not rude.
Just visibly trying to locate the correct social response under pressure.
“H-hi.”
The stutter caught softly at the start of the word.
It should not have done anything to you.
It did.
Grace tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, only to realise the pen was still there. She removed it quickly, stared at it like she had no memory of putting it there, then placed it on the desk.
You were immediately, catastrophically fond of her.
Dempsy, cruelly aware of none or all of this, continued.
“Ashcroft will show you the ropes. Database structure, internal reporting, threat analysis workflow, interagency request process. Try not to overwhelm her.”
Grace blinked.
“Me or her?”
“Yes.”
Then he left.
Just like that.
Coward.
Silence settled between you.
Not uncomfortable exactly.
Just careful.
Grace held the stack of papers against her chest for another second before seeming to realise she was still doing it. She set them down, adjusted them twice, then looked at you.
“So, um…”
You waited.
She glanced at her monitor.
Then at the spare chair.
Then at you.
“You can s-sit. If you want. Or— actually, you should sit. T-this might take a while.”
You pulled out the chair beside her desk.
“Long enough to regret transferring?”
Grace’s mouth twitched.
“N-no. That usually takes a week.”
You smiled.
“There it is.”
She looked at you, confused.
“What?”
“Sense of humour.”
“I wasn’t—”
“You were.”
“I d-don’t have a sense of humour.”
“That was funny too.”
Grace opened her mouth as if to argue, then seemed to think better of it.
She turned to her keyboard instead.
“R-right. Okay. Training.”
Professional retreat.
Interesting.
You sat beside her, close enough to see the faint freckles across the bridge of her nose. Close enough to notice the way she tapped her thumb twice against the side of her mouse before clicking into a secure database.
“So,” she began, “this is the internal case aggregation system. Most analysts use it badly.”
You tilted your head.
“Strong opening.”
“It’s true.”
Her voice was still soft. Still stuttered around the edges. But there was something steadier underneath now. The moment she looked at the data, the nervousness didn’t disappear exactly, but it reorganised itself into focus.
That was fascinating.
Grace Ashcroft nervous around people.
Grace Ashcroft confident around patterns.
You watched her move through the database, and your initial attraction shifted into something sharper.
Respect.
She explained the system with careful precision, occasionally backtracking when she thought she had skipped a step. Her stutter never fully left, but the more she spoke, the more you understood it wasn’t uncertainty about the work.
It was just her.
Her rhythm.
Her voice.
“Every incoming report gets tagged by region, source credibility, incident pattern, and biological risk indicators,” she said. “T-the system flags possible clusters, but it misses context, so you can’t rely on automated matches.”
“Because algorithms are stupid.”
Grace glanced at you.
“Because algorithms are literal.”
“Same thing.”
A small smile.
There and gone.
You wanted another one immediately.
Dangerous.
Very dangerous.
Grace clicked into another file.
“This one’s old. Declassified training copy. Midwest infection scare, livestock vector, false positive.”
You leaned in slightly.
Grace stiffened.
Only a little.
You noticed.
You eased back by half an inch.
She noticed that too.
Her gaze flickered toward you, quick and unreadable.
“You can keep going,” you said.
“I was.”
“I know. I’m encouraging you.”
“That’s… not usually necessary.”
“Maybe I’m being supportive.”
Grace gave you a look.
A real look this time.
Skeptical. Almost dry.
“Are you always like this?”
“Supportive?”
“Annoying.”
You smiled slowly.
“There’s that sense of humour again.”
Grace looked back at her monitor, but you caught the faintest pink at the tips of her ears.
Victory.
Small, but decisive.
For the next twenty minutes, she walked you through database architecture, incident tagging, internal threat summaries, and interagency request formatting. You followed more than you admitted. Less than you wanted.
Mostly because Grace made concentration difficult.
Not deliberately.
That was the worst part.
She had no idea.
She had no idea that every small hesitation, every soft “s-sorry, wait,” every absent adjustment of her glasses was slowly making your first day infinitely more complicated.
She had no idea that when she became absorbed in the explanation, when her nervousness gave way to quiet authority, you found it difficult to look away.
She had no idea that the way she frowned at bad metadata was, somehow, attractive.
That one was especially unfair.
“So,” Grace said, pulling up a blank mock report, “you try.”
You blinked.
“Try what?”
She turned her head.
“Tagging.”
“Right.”
“You weren’t listening.”
“I was listening.”
Grace’s brows lifted slightly.
“Were you?”
“Yes.”
A pause.
“Mostly.”
Her expression changed.
Not quite amusement.
Not quite suspicion.
Something in between.
“Mostly?”
“In my defence, you talk fast when you’re interested.”
Grace looked surprised by that.
“I do?”
“You do.”
“Oh.”
She seemed to absorb that as new information.
Then, quieter—
“S-sorry.”
“Don’t be.”
Her eyes flicked to yours.
You held her gaze, gentler this time.
“It’s nice.”
Grace went still.
Just for a second.
The office kept moving around you. Phones, printers, keyboards, footsteps.
But for that one second, the space between you felt strangely quiet.
Then Grace looked away.
“Y-you should tag the report.”
Professional retreat again.
But softer this time.
You turned to the screen, deciding to let her have the escape.
For now.
The training report was straightforward enough. You skimmed the details, selected the region, marked source credibility, and started assigning risk indicators.
Grace watched beside you.
You could feel her attention.
Not intrusive.
Focused.
Measured.
The way someone watches because they’re trying to understand how you think.
“You’re fast,” she said.
You clicked another field.
“Military habit.”
“Data work?”
“Threat assessment. Pattern recognition. Mostly people, movements, supply routes.”
Grace nodded slowly.
“That transfers.”
“Glad I’m not completely useless.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Comforting.”
“I mean—” Grace faltered. “I d-didn’t mean you were useless. I meant— you’re not. Obviously. Dempsy wouldn’t assign you here if—”
“Grace.”
She stopped.
Your voice had gone softer without permission.
Her name felt different out loud.
She looked at you.
You smiled.
“I was teasing.”
“Oh.”
A beat.
“R-right.”
Her shoulders lowered a fraction.
You noticed she didn’t correct you for using her first name.
Interesting.
“You can tease back, you know,” you said.
“I can’t.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“I’m bad at it.”
“That’s not a no.”
Grace looked as though she very much wanted to argue but couldn’t find a logical entry point.
Cute.
Again.
Always.
She looked at the report instead.
“You missed a tag.”
You glanced back at the screen.
“Did I?”
“Possible vector uncertainty.”
“Where?”
Grace leaned closer.
She reached across you, not quite touching, and pointed at a line buried halfway through the report.
“There. The language is vague. ‘Unknown environmental exposure’ usually means no one wanted to admit they lost the sample chain.”
Her sleeve brushed your arm.
Brief.
Accidental.
Enough.
You became sharply aware of how close she was.
The scent of coffee and clean fabric.
The quiet concentration in her face.
The line of her jaw.
The fact that she trusted the space enough to lean into it.
Then Grace seemed to realise the proximity at the exact same moment.
Her hand froze.
Her eyes moved from the screen to your arm.
Then to your face.
For half a heartbeat, she didn’t move.
Neither did you.
Her lips parted slightly.
Then she pulled back too quickly and nearly hit her elbow against the desk.
“S-sorry.”
You kept your tone light, because anything else would have been cruel.
“You’re very apologetic for someone who just saved my report.”
Grace adjusted her glasses.
“I didn’t save it. It’s a training copy.”
“You saved my pride.”
“That seems unlikely.”
You laughed.
Grace looked startled by the sound again.
But this time, she didn’t look away immediately.
For a moment, she watched you like she was trying to figure out what to do with someone who laughed easily in her space.
Like she wasn’t sure whether to be wary of it.
Or warmed by it.
--------------------
Grace did not know what to do with you.
That was the problem.
New recruits were usually nervous, overconfident, or painfully eager to prove themselves. You were some uncomfortable blend of competent and impossible.
You listened.
Actually listened.
Not just to the training. To her.
You noticed when she hesitated. Not in a way that made her feel exposed, but in a way that made her feel seen, which was arguably worse.
You smiled too much.
Not at everyone.
At her.
Grace had no evidence this was intentional.
She still disliked how quickly her brain had filed the information away.
She looked at the screen while you worked through the report, but her attention kept catching on small things.
The calm set of your shoulders.
The way you leaned back when she needed more space.
The way your humour never pushed too hard.
The way you said her name like it was normal.
Grace wasn’t used to normal.
Not anymore.
Maybe not ever.
She glanced at the photo beside her monitor.
Alyssa.
Emily.
Hope.
Her chest tightened, familiar and bearable.
Then you cleared your throat gently.
“Vector uncertainty tag?”
Grace blinked.
You were looking at her.
Waiting.
Not impatient.
Just there.
She swallowed.
“Y-yeah. Good.”
Your smile softened.
And Grace, against her better judgment, smiled back.
Only a little.
But enough.
--------------------
By lunch, you had learned three things.
One: FBI analytics involved far more forms than any sane person should tolerate.
Two: Grace Ashcroft was terrifyingly intelligent.
Three: you were in serious trouble.
The third point became obvious when Grace forgot to eat.
It was subtle at first.
Someone from another desk asked if anyone wanted food from the café downstairs. Three people answered. Grace didn’t seem to hear.
You waited.
She kept typing.
The cold coffee beside her had not moved.
“You eat lunch?” you asked.
Grace didn’t look up.
“Mhm.”
“When?”
“What?”
“When do you eat lunch?”
She glanced at the clock.
Then froze.
“Oh.”
You leaned back.
“That sounds like never.”
“I was going to.”
“Convincing.”
“I was.”
“Grace.”
She looked at you.
“You’re a bad liar.”
“I’m not lying. I’m… mismanaging time.”
“That’s a very analyst way to say skipping lunch.”
Grace looked mildly offended.
Then mildly caught.
Then she sighed.
“I have crackers.”
“Do you want real food?”
“I have crackers.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
She looked at you for a second too long.
Like the question itself had confused her.
Not because she didn’t understand it.
Because maybe people didn’t ask very often.
Something in your chest tightened.
You stood.
“Come on.”
Grace blinked.
“What?”
“Lunch.”
“I c-can’t. I have to finish this.”
“It’ll still be classified and depressing in twenty minutes.”
Her mouth twitched.
“I shouldn’t leave the files open.”
“Then lock your computer.”
“I—”
She stopped.
Because that was a reasonable solution.
You watched her realise it.
Then watched her dislike that she had realised it.
“You’re very bossy for a recruit,” she said.
You grinned.
“Former military.”
“That explains very little and too much.”
“There’s the humour.”
Grace shook her head, but she locked her computer.
You considered that a win.
The café downstairs was small, overly bright, and smelled better than the office by a wide margin. Grace stood beside you in the queue with the posture of someone unused to being removed from her natural habitat.
“You look uncomfortable,” you said.
“I’m fine.”
“You look like someone confiscated your spreadsheets.”
Grace glanced sideways at you.
“That would be serious.”
“I believe you.”
She looked down at the food display, worrying her thumb against the side of her index finger.
Another habit.
You were collecting them now.
You probably shouldn’t.
“What do you usually get?” you asked.
“Coffee.”
“That’s not food.”
“It has calories.”
“Grace.”
She looked at you, and there it was again.
That tiny pause when you said her name.
You wondered if she noticed it too.
Maybe she did, because she quickly looked back at the display.
“Soup,” she said. “Sometimes.”
“Soup it is.”
“I can choose my own lunch.”
“I know.”
“Then why did that sound like an order?”
“Because soup it is.”
Grace stared at you.
Then, unexpectedly, she laughed under her breath.
Small.
Almost unwilling.
The sound landed somewhere behind your ribs and stayed there.
You were absolutely doomed.
At a small table near the window, Grace sat across from you with a bowl of soup, a bottle of water, and the faint air of someone who had been tricked into self-care.
You unwrapped your sandwich.
She stirred her soup once.
Twice.
Then looked at you.
“So. Former military.”
You nodded.
“So. FBI technical analyst.”
Grace’s eyes narrowed slightly.
“You’re deflecting.”
“So are you.”
“I asked first.”
“Didn’t know there were rules.”
“There are always rules.”
That was the most Grace Ashcroft sentence you’d heard all day.
You smiled.
“I did threat assessment. Some field coordination. Some classified work. Nothing I can talk about in a basement café with bad lighting.”
Grace nodded, accepting the boundary immediately.
You liked that.
More than you should.
“Why analyst division?” she asked.
You considered giving the clean answer.
Career progression. Transferable skills. Stability.
Instead, you gave her a true one.
“I got tired of only seeing threats after they were already moving.”
Grace’s expression softened almost imperceptibly.
You wondered what she heard in that answer.
Regret maybe.
Exhaustion.
Recognition.
“That makes sense,” she said quietly.
“What about you?”
Grace looked down at her soup.
The air changed.
Just slightly.
Not enough for anyone else to notice.
Enough for you.
“Data analytics,” she said.
A rehearsed answer.
You didn’t push.
“Good thing you’re scary good at it then.”
Grace looked up.
“I’m not scary.”
“No. The good at it part was scary.”
Her eyes flickered with something you couldn’t quite name.
Embarrassment.
Disbelief.
Pleasure, maybe.
“You’ve seen one morning.”
“I’ve seen enough.”
She swallowed.
Then stirred her soup again.
“T-thanks.”
Soft.
Sincere.
You looked away first.
Not because you wanted to.
Because if you kept looking, you were going to make your problem obvious on day one.
And Dempsy had specifically warned you.
Preventative warning.
Annoyingly valid.
When you returned upstairs, Grace seemed different.
Not dramatically.
Just a little less braced.
She walked beside you instead of half a step ahead. She still held herself carefully, still kept her voice soft, still stuttered through explanations, but something in the air between you had shifted.
Not trust.
Not yet.
But the first outline of it.
Back at her desk, she noticed the cold coffee and frowned.
You picked it up before she could.
“I’ll get you a fresh one.”
Grace blinked.
“You don’t have to.”
“I know.”
“I can get my own coffee.”
“I know that too.”
“Then why—”
“Because I’m getting one anyway.”
Grace looked at you carefully.
You held her gaze.
A beat passed.
Then she looked away.
“Milk. No sugar.”
You smiled.
“Noted.”
As you turned, you heard her voice again.
Quiet.
Almost too quiet.
“Thank you.”
You glanced back.
Grace was looking at her monitor now, but her hand had drifted toward the photo frame beside it, fingertips resting lightly against the edge.
You didn’t comment.
Some things were not for teasing.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever.
By the time you returned with coffee, Grace had another file open.
She accepted the cup with both hands, as if surprised by its warmth.
Her fingers brushed yours again.
This time, neither of you moved quite fast enough to pretend you hadn’t noticed.
“Thanks,” she said.
The word caught softly.
You sat beside her again.
“Anytime.”
Grace stared at the coffee for one second too long.
Then back at the screen.
“R-right. So. Interagency reports.”
“Lead the way, Ashcroft.”
She looked at you sharply.
“Grace is fine.”
You blinked.
She seemed to realise what she’d said at the same time you did.
Colour rose faintly in her cheeks.
“I mean— since you already— it’s not— professionally, it’s fine. Either is fine.”
You smiled before you could stop yourself.
“Grace, then.”
Her name settled between you.
Soft.
Dangerous.
She turned back to the monitor.
“Y-yeah.”
For the rest of the afternoon, she taught you how to read between lines that weren’t supposed to exist.
Missing details. Repeated phrasing. Suspiciously clean reports. Government language that meant someone had either made a mistake or buried one.
You learned quickly.
Grace noticed.
You knew she did because she started giving you harder examples.
Then harder ones.
Then, eventually, one that made you pause.
“Is this still a training file?” you asked.
Grace hesitated.
“Yes.”
You looked at her.
She looked back.
“…mostly.”
You laughed.
“There it is again.”
“What?”
“Your terrible lying.”
Grace actually smiled this time.
Small, yes.
But real.
You felt it like a victory you hadn’t earned.
Outside the office windows, evening settled into the city, turning the glass dark. People began leaving in waves. Chairs rolled back. Monitors shut off. Conversations thinned.
Grace didn’t move.
Of course she didn’t.
You watched her skim another report, coffee now half-finished beside her.
“You always stay late?” you asked.
She didn’t look up.
“S-sometimes.”
“That means yes.”
“I have work.”
“Everyone has work.”
“Mine follows me.”
The answer was too honest to tease.
You leaned back quietly.
Grace seemed to realise what she’d said and immediately busied herself with closing a tab.
“I mean— not literally.”
“I know.”
“I just— after everything, it’s easier to—”
She stopped.
Your chest tightened again.
After everything.
There it was.
The shape of what she didn’t say.
Wrenwood. Raccoon City. Elpis. Emily. Alyssa. Leon.
Names you knew only from briefings and headlines and classified summaries with too many redactions.
To Grace, they weren’t case files.
They were scars.
You kept your voice gentle.
“You don’t have to explain.”
Grace’s hand stilled on the mouse.
For a moment, she didn’t speak.
Then she nodded once.
Small.
Grateful.
“Okay.”
The office was nearly empty now.
Her monitor lit the edges of her face.
She looked tired.
Still pretty.
Still guarded.
Still impossibly interesting.
And for one reckless second, you wanted to reach over and take the pen from behind her ear again, just to see if she would smile.
You didn’t.
Not a mistake on day one.
You stood instead.
“I should let you get back to mismanaging time.”
Grace looked up.
There was something in her expression you hadn’t seen before.
Not disappointment.
Not quite.
But close enough to make your pulse trip.
“You’re leaving?”
The question sounded automatic.
Like it had slipped out before she could stop it.
You softened.
“First day. Thought I’d avoid setting a terrible precedent.”
Grace looked away quickly.
“R-right. Yeah. That’s… good.”
You picked up your bag.
“I’ll see you tomorrow?”
She nodded.
“Tomorrow.”
A pause.
Then—
“Don’t be late.”
You grinned.
“I thought military early counted as late.”
“It does.”
“Then I’ll be very late.”
Grace’s mouth curved.
This time, she didn’t hide it fast enough.
You walked away before the smile could fully ruin you.
At the corridor, you glanced back once.
Grace was watching you.
The moment your eyes met, she looked down at her desk, flustered, reaching for a file that was already in her hand.
You bit back a laugh.
Definitely doomed.
Behind you, the office lights hummed.
Ahead of you, the elevator doors opened.
And all you could think was that Grace Ashcroft had said your tomorrow like it mattered.
Maybe it didn’t.
Not yet.
But it would.
You had a feeling it would.
--------------------
End of Chapter One.
