Chapter Text
“Who the fuck is that?”
“That,” Erica says, gesturing toward the desk right outside Derek’s office, “is your new assistant.”
Derek doesn’t try to conceal his displeasure, leveling her with a glare while he frowns. “What happened to the girl? Betsy?”
“Beatrice,” Erica corrects him. “She was bringing down the office morale, always running to the bathroom to cry. I reassigned her to Liam’s desk.”
Derek huffs a sigh, shaking his head as he shoves a folder aside on his desk so he can put down the coffee Erica just handed him. “You want me to apologize to her, I imagine.”
“I actually don’t care,” she dismisses. “And neither does she, I suspect. She got a small raise and a paid vacation, and her new desk is closer to the elevators. Everybody wins.”
“You gave her a raise?”
Erica scoffs at him. “Just the raise she would’ve gotten at the end of the year. Don’t worry, it’s not favoritism.”
“More like buying her off,” Derek sighs. He glances out the glass walls of his office again, examining the tall figure sitting at the desk. He’s dressed in an ill-fitting blazer, hair a little too messy; Derek didn’t even notice him five minutes ago when he walked in, probably because he’s so nondescript. “College kid?” he asks Erica.
“Graduate. Fresh out of corporate training,” she cheerily informs him. “I picked him special for you.”
“Not a crier, then.”
Erica beams. “No, not a crier. I’m actually looking forward to the first time you yell at him. He’s gonna make you cry.”
“I don’t yell,” Derek tuts.
“Uh huh,” Erica says, eyes focused on the tablet in her hands. “Okay, your day is pretty packed—I’m more or less handling your schedule for the first week while Stiles is getting settled. He’ll shadow me a little bit and figure out the way it works.”
“Stiles,” Derek echoes, face twisting. “What kind of name is that?”
“If you say ‘back in my day,’ I swear I’ll throw something at you,” Erica informs him.
“It’s not a generational gap,” Derek protests, “it’s a—a logic gap. Or a cultural gap, maybe. Stiles. Like the pop singer?”
“Jesus Christ,” Erica says, already going to the door of Derek’s office. It snicks open gently before she says, “Stiles, can you join us please? Bring your pad.”
The kid—and maybe he’s not a kid, but anyone 20 years younger than Derek is a kid to him—moves quickly from his desk through the door that Erica holds open for him. He can’t be older than 22, big glasses sitting lopsided on his nose, wearing a tie that doesn’t match his shirt.
“Don’t say anything,” Erica warns Derek, pointing at him. “I’m taking him to see Isaac at lunchtime.” Their local fashion guru—the guy who picks out all of Derek’s clothes—will certainly know how to help this kid.
“Fine,” Derek acquiesces. He offers a hand to Stiles. “Derek Hale. Nice to meet you.”
Stiles smiles half-heartedly as they shake. “Stiles. We met once before. When I was an intern here last year.”
“Of course,” Derek says, even though he doesn’t remember that at all. He meets people all the time—but it’s someone else’s job to remember that stuff for him. “Do you have a surname, Stiles?”
“Stilinski.” He laughs gently when Derek’s face reveals his confusion. “My legal name is a mouthful, everyone’s called me Stiles my whole life.”
“Got it,” Derek says shortly, and he nods at Erica.
“Every day,” she says, looking at Stiles, “you’ll be in charge of Derek’s calendar. You are the doorman, the keeper of his schedule—you make sure the trains run on time. Which means being firm with people who want to see him, and being firm with him.”
Stiles looks back and forth between the two of them, but says nothing.
“Every morning, you’ll start with the planned schedule,” she goes on, “but things usually get off track by lunch.”
“Or 10 AM,” Derek mutters.
Erica hands Stiles the tablet she’s holding. “Here, he’s going to bitch and moan but you just report what he’s got on his plate.”
“Okay,” Stiles says, and clears his throat. “Uh, first you have senior staff in the conference room—over breakfast. Then at 9:30 you have a conference call with Mr. Hale—Peter—and Ms. Hale—Laura.”
“It’s easier just to use first names around here,” Derek tells him. “We’re not stuffy, we don’t mind.”
The hint of a smile quirks at the corner of Stiles’ mouth. “At 10:30 you have an update from the nonfiction editors, and at noon you have lunch with the nonfiction EIC.”
“Which will probably happen around one o’clock,” Erica chimes in. “You’re also going to be making all of Derek’s reservations—the book is on your desk.”
“I remember from training,” Stiles says easily.
Erica looks deeply pleased. “Wonderful. What’s after lunch?”
“At 2,” Stiles goes on, glancing down at the tablet before looking back to Derek, “you have a meeting with legal.”
Derek makes a face. “Why?”
“Not legal,” Erica corrects, “just Deaton.”
“Oh,” Derek says, realization washing over him. Deaton is a lawyer with the publishing house, but he’s also Derek’s personal attorney; the meeting, he remembers, is about Eli’s trust fund. “Okay,” he agrees. “I want a note taker for that.”
“Stiles can do that,” Erica says.
“Fine,” Derek says with a shrug. “What’s next?”
“After that, your day is unscheduled,” Stiles tells him. “But you made a note last week that you wanted to have finished reading the new Delgado manuscript before you meet with your fiction editors on Wednesday, so. I would probably do that.”
Derek is suitably impressed. Stiles has caught up on Derek’s previous week already. “Good,” he says, nodding his thanks. He looks Stiles up and down again, this time zeroing in on his sneakers. “Fix that,” he says to Erica, pointing at the shoes. “And see if one of the girls downstairs can come give him a haircut.”
“Hey,” Stiles huffs, “I’m right here.”
“And you represent me,” Derek says, already booting up his computer instead of looking at his new assistant. “If this is going to work, you need to look like a professional. I hope you don’t have an emotional attachment to that blazer.”
“Uh. No. Not particularly.”
“Good,” Derek says, and nods at Erica. “Burn it. And have Isaac pick some ties from his century.”
“Look, Mr. Hale—”
“Derek.”
Stiles’ eyebrows do something that Derek can’t quite parse. “I appreciate that I’ve been given a big chance here, and I already told Ms. Reyes how grateful I am for the leap of faith, but I was making minimum wage last week. I can’t just buy a new wardrobe.”
“Oh, sweetie,” Erica laughs, “it’s a corporate expense. Don’t worry, I’ll show you how it works.” She snaps her fingers at Derek. “Senior staff. We ordered real food, so you better eat something. Not just coffee.”
“Whatever,” he dismisses. “Is there a note taker for that?”
“Boyd’s girl is doing it,” she says. “I’ll be teaching Stiles the crucial ins and outs, like how to know when to cancel a meeting or how to tell when you’re done drinking caffeine for the day.”
“Fine,” Derek says. “What do I need?”
“Laptop should be fine.”
“Thanks.” He scoops the device into his arm and picks his coffee back up with the other hand. He nods politely at Stiles. “Get to work.”
-0-
Stiles is surprisingly efficient. Effective. There’s a learning curve, to be sure, but the first time Derek raises his voice over something, he’s met with an icy glare and a sarcastic, “Well why didn’t you just say so?” and it makes him feel like a toddler being scolded by a babysitter. Jeez. Erica really did find a good pick. And once he’s wearing reasonable shoes and a jacket that fits, he looks like a professional adult, a grownup, not a college kid faking it. His new haircut suits him too.
-0-
“Good morning,” Stiles greets with his typical half-smile. “Coffee’s on your desk, senior staff in ten.”
“Thanks,” Derek says, shoving into his office with Stiles following behind. “Let’s hear it.”
Stiles rattles off his schedule for the day while he takes a sip of his coffee—which Stiles brings to him in a rotating collection of travel mugs instead of constant disposable cups—and opens up his computer. Nothing is surprising, except for Stiles says—
“And your son wanted to know if you were available for dinner tonight.”
Derek frowns down at his screen and then up at Stiles. “Eli called?” Normally, Eli calls Erica or his mother when he needs something; he doesn’t reach out directly to Derek. Ever since the divorce, their relationship has been…strained.
“Right when I got in,” Stiles confirms with a nod. “You know, it’s kind of hard to believe I haven’t met him. Doesn’t he go to Berkeley?”
“Did you visit your father often during your first year of college?”
Stiles scoffs gently. “I would call it more visiting the free laundry at his house than anything else.”
“Eli’s always a yes,” Derek says, clicking open his email app.
“I know,” Stiles says, “but he can’t meet until after 7, and that’s cutting it close with the redeye.”
“Shit,” Derek sighs. In the haze of thinking he’d get to see Eli for the first time in months, he’d almost forgotten that he’s headed to New York tonight. “See if he can do lunch instead. I’ll send a car.”
“Already offered. He has class.”
Eli is never going to make it easy, is he? “Fine,” Derek says, “quick dinner. We’ll be at the airport by nine.”
“You know the flight leaves at—”
“I know,” Derek cuts him off, and then withers under his gaze. “Sorry. We’re not checking any luggage—an hour is plenty of time to get through security that late at night.”
“Okay,” Stiles agrees easily. “You want me to pick your dinner reservation or ask Eli?”
“Whatever you pick will be fine,” Derek says, opening an email idly. “He’s a vegetarian, I think. He was over the summer, anyway.”
“Gotcha. Veggie options. I’ll pick somewhere near the airport.”
“Not too near the airport.” He pokes at a pile on his desk. “Is this today’s stuff?”
“Layout options for this quarter’s edition of the youth fiction journal. The design team is anxious for your approval.”
“Yeah, that’s not happening,” Derek dismisses. “The meeting’s not until next week, I’ll look at them when we’re back from New York.”
“Sure thing.” Stiles dutifully comes around the desk and picks up the pile. “Senior staff. Conference room. Go eat something.”
Derek nods his begrudging assent. Erica has really turned this kid into her own personal spy, hasn’t she.
-0-
Derek married Jennifer right out of college. They were in love. They were even happy, for a while. They had a timeline, everything planned out—Derek finished grad school and took a junior position at his uncle’s publishing company, they moved into their first real home, and then Eli was born. By the time Derek was thirty, he had a wife, a toddler, and a 401k. The dream.
He wasn’t a very good husband. He knows that. He never cheated, but—he was neglectful. Dismissive. He took advantage of Jenn in various ways, and at the time he told himself it was fine because she was taking advantage of him too, using his salary as an excuse not to work, filling her days with homemaking and neighborhood friends. Eventually, at some point during the divorce process, he realized how selfish he’d been. And by that point it was too late to do anything except apologize, even though Jenn didn’t really want to hear it. He doesn’t blame her.
They’re better as friends. Co-parents. She has a boyfriend now, and they’re able to talk on the phone without the conversation devolving into a tiff. He’s happy for her, mostly.
But he’s also jealous that Eli chose her in the end. They broke up when he was sixteen, and when they told him that he could choose whether he wanted to live with one of them or move back and forth on some kind of schedule, he stuck his chin out and defiantly said he’d stay with his mother. Derek knows what Eli thinks—he thinks there was someone else. Someone from work. Someone that he chose over Jenn.
It’s not like Derek’s eyes never strayed. He’s not perfect, not entirely guiltless. He never cheated, but he knows deep in his gut that if there had been an attractive enough option, he probably would’ve. If there’d been someone Derek actually wanted—wanted the way he used to want Jenn—he wouldn’t have been able to control himself over something as silly as a couple of vows he made years and years ago. So really he’s lucky that no one like that ever crossed his path. Or things could’ve been a lot worse.
The best thing to come out of his marriage is Eli. He’s a good kid, a smart kid, and even though he’s really different from Derek, he’s the best thing Derek has ever done in his life. Bar none. Which is why it’s been so difficult to be on the outs with him. He’s relieved and grateful and also sort of confused about Eli making dinner plans through his assistant.
Stiles is meeting him at the airport after dinner, and he has their bags so Derek takes an Uber Black from the downtown offices to the restaurant in San Mateo.
Eli looks different than the last time Derek saw him—three months ago, when he was helping move Eli into his dorm. He has the start of scruff around his cheeks and jaw, and his hair has a streak of blue in it. They hug, but it seems perfunctory, performative.
“Hey, kid,” Derek says, squeezing his shoulder. “It’s great to see you.”
“Yeah,” Eli says. “You hungry?”
“Yeah, let’s eat.”
The restaurant is pretty packed, but that’s not surprising for a Friday night. Derek does his best not to glance at his watch too often, trying to stay focused on Eli. They make it through an entire appetizer before Eli clears his throat and says—
“I’ve been thinking.”
Derek shifts in his seat. “Okay.”
“I really hate the dorms.”
“Oh,” Derek says, relaxing slightly. He’d come up with several dramatic things Eli could want to talk to him about that warranted a dinner reservation. He didn’t expect this. “You don’t get along with your roommate?”
“He’s fine,” Eli says with a shrug, “but it’s pretty fucking miserable there, Dad. No privacy, half the guys haven’t figured out they need to buy their own deodorant when it runs out, and I keep getting sexiled.”
“Sexiled,” Derek echoes.
Eli sighs, gesturing vaguely. “Kevin, my roommate, he has a girlfriend.”
“I see.”
“I know we talked about you getting me an apartment for sophomore year,” Eli goes on. “Maybe we just move that timeline up a little.”
Derek’s first instinct is to refuse him. After all, he’s already paying room and board on top of tuition. But it seems a small price to pay to get on Eli’s good side. And maybe that’s a bribe, some kind of manipulation, but it would get both of them something they want, so Derek is having a hard time coming up with a reason to say no.
“On one condition,” Derek says.
Eli blinks, an apprehensive sort of excitement in his eyes. “What condition?”
“You get a job. A real job—fifteen, twenty hours a week—so you can stop using my credit cards for things other than groceries and Uber.”
“That sounds like two conditions,” Eli says.
“Do you want an apartment?”
Eli’s mouth curls into a delighted smile as he nods. “Yeah. Okay. I can get a job. Maybe your secretary can help me out there.”
“Assistant,” Derek corrects calmly. “He wouldn’t like being called a secretary.”
“Sure,” Eli says. “Your assistant. I get special nepotism benefits, don’t I?”
Derek shrugs. “If you really want a job there, of course. I thought you’d prefer something more…sciency.”
“I’d prefer something reliable,” Eli tells him. “And if my dad’s the boss, I can’t get fired.”
“Famous last words,” Derek says dryly.
-0-
The whole company shuts down for Christmas, but Thanksgiving is a different story. The Hales are Mexican and Scottish by ancestry, having settled in California before it was ever part of the US, and they have a whole thing about Thanksgiving. Derek doesn’t care about giving people an excuse to take a long weekend, but he wants to still be able to go to work on the Wednesday before the holiday and be productive. Unlike apparently everyone else in the office.
He glares at the turkey-themed headband Stiles is wearing hard enough that he hopes it bursts into flames.
“Have some whimsy, man,” Stiles protests when Derek makes a snarky comment about it. “Not a Thanksgiving fan, then?”
“No,” Derek says, voice full of sarcasm, “I love eating dry turkey to commemorate the slaughter of the native population.”
“Noted.” Stiles whips the headband off and tucks it in his back pocket; Derek distantly notices how soft his hair looks. “Your day’s pretty chill, just a reduced senior staff meeting, phone call with Laura at 11, and then you’re free to catch up on stuff. I left a list on your desktop, ranked in order of timeliness.”
“Thanks.” He sniffs the coffee Stiles left on his desk. “This isn’t pumpkin, is it?”
“No,” Stiles says, “but I did put cinnamon in it today. You liked it last time.”
“Yeah,” Derek says with a nod. “Thanks.”
“No pressure or anything, but—do you know what time you might wanna be calling it quits today?”
There’s a funny look of hope in his gaze. Derek realizes for the first time that he might be keeping Stiles from holiday travel.
“Family plans?” Derek asks.
“Not exactly. It’s just me and my dad, but I’m heading up to see him for the weekend and I thought I’d leave today if we get out before, like, six.”
“Up where?”
“Tiny town, northeast of the city. Beacon Hills.”
“I’ve heard of it,” Derek says with a nod. “Yeah, of course. You can leave after my meeting with Laura.”
Stiles’ face brightens. “Really?”
“Don’t act so surprised,” Derek huffs. “I’m not unreasonable.”
“I know,” Stiles says with a laugh, “but I just thought—I dunno. Erica said you can get kind of prickly around the holidays.”
“Everybody gets weird around the holidays,” Derek dismisses. “And Erica shouldn’t be gossiping about me.”
“Uh huh. Does she know that?”
Derek rolls his eyes, gestures dismissively toward the door. “That’s all for now, Stiles.”
“Sure thing, boss. Don’t forget—senior staff. There’s breakfast burritos.”
-0-
Erica is the office manager, which means she handles all the little logistical things that Derek doesn’t have the time for. Including things like holiday gifts and bonuses. But she signs his name on everything, which means in January, everyone in the company is eager to shake his hand and thank him for the “thoughtful gift” or the “generous recognition.” Derek knows it’s just part of the gig, but he fucking hates it.
Stiles rescues him from the hallway with a loud clap and an announcement: “Mr. Hale has a busy day! Excuse us!”
Safely behind his office door, Derek heaves a sigh of relief. “Thank you for that.”
“It’s my job,” Stiles dismisses. “You’ll get off track if every time you step out of your office, people want some face time.”
“Right.” He settles behind his desk, bringing his computer to life. “Did you have a good break?”
Stiles shrugs. “Sure, more or less.”
“See your dad?”
“And some high school friends.”
“That’s nice.”
“Hm.”
Derek arches an eyebrow. “What? It’s not nice?”
Stiles’ cheeks are tinged pink. “It’s not important. And not professional to discuss with my boss.”
“Ah,” Derek says, refocusing on his computer. “Your girlfriend’s mad you didn’t make enough time for her over the holidays, right?” It’s a familiar refrain—what else are girlfriends mad about?
“I’m single,” Stiles informs him. “But I sorta hooked up with my ex while I was home, and it’s turned out to be a pretty bad decision.”
“Getting back with an ex is almost always a bad decision,” Derek opines. “You’re young, you’ll figure that out.”
“We’re not together or anything,” Stiles dismisses. “Once the drunken New Year’s haze wore off, I remembered all the reasons we broke up in the first place. Now I just get to deal with him pestering me at midnight for the next few weeks before he moves on to his next victim.”
Derek’s brain lingers on the pronouns—him, he, his. Stiles is queer. And sure, maybe—probably—Derek should’ve known that. But he doesn’t like to assume. “High school boyfriend?” he asks casually, still clicking through his email.
“He probably would protest the label,” Stiles says with a laugh, “but sure. We were both pretty closeted at the time.”
“That sucks.”
“Yeah, well. That’s life, right?” He clears his throat. “Sorry for, uh, the digression. You wanna talk about your schedule?”
Derek pretends to listen, but mostly he’s thinking about how he hasn’t had a date in a while. Hasn’t had sex. Hasn’t had much social contact of any kind in years, actually. God, he’s fucking pathetic. That’s the only reason he’s captivated by the shape of Stiles’ nose, the angle of his jaw, the broadness of his shoulders. He just—needs to get laid.
-0-
Derek has a really nice life. A job that he likes in the city he loves, friends that he can count on, family that bugs him without annoying him, and the best apartment in the city. His apartment is bigger than most San Francisco apartments, he knows. It’s bigger and grander and sort of show-offy, which only bothers him to the extent that it doesn’t really reflect him as much as it reflects his position. It has three bedrooms and two full bathrooms, plus a half-bath off the living room. It has an office that Derek mostly uses as a library, and a kitchen that he hardly spends any time in. (A caterer brings prepped meals twice a week; he just opens his fridge and picks something to heat up.) The best part of it is the balcony, with a view looking out toward the bay. It’s romantic up there, and Derek’s kept this place for so many years because of that view.
Derek hasn’t really dated since his divorce. He let Erica set him up a few times, and he got some sex out of it, but nothing ever really clicked. Nobody really caught his attention. But he’s forty-six now, and he doesn’t want to be single forever; he’d like to find that elusive thing he thought he had once with Jenn. Love. That would be—nice.
“You have to make time for it, you know,” Erica tells him when he’s lying on the couch in her office, complaining. (It’s his lunch hour, and he’s hiding from the phone call he’s meant to take with Peter. Stiles is playing referee, protecting Derek from his uncle.) “If you actually want to find someone, you have to leave the office before sunset. Spend your weekends outside your apartment.”
“I leave the apartment,” Derek protests.
“To go running,” Erica scoffs. “Which is not exactly a social activity. Especially not the way you do it, with your headphones and your grumpy expression.” She takes a pointed sip of her iced coffee and gestures at him with a perfectly manicured nail. “You need a matchmaker.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Why not?” Erica insists. “I know some good ones. They’re professional and discreet; they’d help you weed out the gold diggers.”
“It seems so…pathetic. Paying someone to help me find a date.”
“And whining on my couch is way less pathetic.”
Derek winces. She has a point. “Maybe,” he grunts, unhappily. “But just to find me a date for the gala.”
Erica laughs triumphantly. “I’ll get right on that.”
“How’s it going with Boyd?”
“Oh, you know. He’s obsessed with me and I let him buy me pretty things.” She gestures to the necklace she’s wearing, which isn’t dramatic but is gorgeous. Derek would bet any amount of money that it’s a 24k gold chain, with a real emerald in the pendant. “I’m thinking of holding out until the summer. Maybe he’ll buy me an island.”
“He can’t afford an island.”
“Then you should pay him more.”
“I can’t afford an island.”
“Boo hoo.”
Derek sighs, tilting his head back toward the ceiling. “I’m old.”
“Where the fuck did that come from?”
“It’s true, isn’t it? I’m a middle-aged divorcee. With a teenager.”
“He’ll be twenty before you know it,” Erica says.
“Don’t remind me.”
“You’re not old,” Erica tells him. “You’ve got some salt and pepper going on, but you run a five-minute mile and you go to the gym way more than most middle-aged guys. Even without the money, you seriously don’t think you’re a catch?”
Derek shrugs. “I don’t know what people want anymore. If I ever did.”
“You’re ridiculous,” Erica sighs. “Nobody who matters is going to care that you’re divorced, or that you have a kid. Most of the women in your age group are in the same boat.”
Derek’s displeasure must show on his face, because Erica makes an affronted noise.
“Okay, fucking hypocrite,” she chastises.
“Sorry,” Derek mutters. “I just—I don’t know. It’s hard to imagine myself dating another parent.”
There’s a gentle rap of knuckles against the door. Erica shouts, “Come in!” and the door pushes open.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Stiles says, gesturing at his wrist. “Derek has a meeting across town and he has to leave right now or he’ll be late.”
“Always another meeting,” Erica coos. “Fine, get out. I’ll see what I can do about the gala.”
Derek waves his wordless thanks to her as he leaves, walking shoulder-to-shoulder with Stiles toward the elevator. Stiles is, as usual, carrying Derek’s coat and briefcase, and Derek stuffs his hands in his pockets so he doesn’t feel so useless.
“What’s happening with the gala?” Stiles asks as they step into the elevator car. It’s just friendly conversation, Derek knows, not weighted.
“I need a date,” he admits. “It looks anti-social if I show up alone. Erica’s helping.”
“She’s gonna be your date?”
“No,” Derek laughs, amused by the thought. “She’s helping me find a date. Someone who looks good in photos and knows how to behave at a society function.”
“Oh, society,” Stiles drawls. “So fancy.”
Derek looks him up and down. “You know you need to bring a date too.”
“Nuh uh. I’m working the event, not attending it.”
“You’re not a waiter,” Derek huffs. “You can’t be my third wheel all night—you need to bring a date. I thought Erica told you.”
Stiles makes a face, a combination of a frown and something more like annoyance. “She was serious?”
“She rarely jokes about things like this. She’ll help you find someone if you want. Someone who owns a suit.”
The younger man groans dramatically. “Jeez. Fine, I guess. Not about Erica helping me—I can find my own date.”
The elevator stops on the ground floor, and Derek follows Stiles out to the street, where the car is already waiting. The driver opens the backdoor for both of them to slip through, and then they’re in the back of the tinted SUV, Stiles opening up his phone while Derek stares pointedly out the window.
“I date women too, you know,” Stiles says a minute later.
“Huh?”
“You said I need to find someone who owns a suit—I don’t just date men. I’m bi.”
Derek nods. “Okay. Sorry for assuming.”
“No, it’s just—I actually only brought it up because I have a friend you might get along with.” He clears his throat. “She’s nearly your age, and her family is, like, super old money. She’d know how to behave at an event. I could set you guys up.”
Derek blinks. “This friend,” he echoes. “She’s someone you used to date?”
“Not exactly,” Stiles says with a shrug. “She was sort of one of my professors at Stanford.”
“But you slept with her.”
Stiles gives him a weary look. “Is that, like, against your moral code or something? She wasn’t my professor when we hooked up.”
Derek sighs to himself, shaking his head. “I should know less about you.”
Stiles laughs. “Yeah, well, I know way too much about you too. We’ll just have to trust each other.”
Unfortunately true. “I’m going to let Erica pick my date,” Derek says, dismissive but not cruel. “But you should bring her if she knows how to behave. These events always need more beautiful women.”
“Okay,” Stiles agrees easily.
He refocuses on his phone, and Derek stares straight ahead, doing his best not to think about the fact that Stiles had a sexual relationship with a woman at least ten years his senior. That Stiles is still apparently friendly with an older woman he used to sleep with.
That’s—fine. What does Derek care? He doesn’t. Not at all.
-0-
Derek’s date to the gala is a woman who works for the state supreme court, a petite and gorgeous woman with curly black hair and smooth, dark skin. Her name is Braeden, and they go on two perfectly acceptable dates leading up to the event itself, one of which ends in sex; she’s appropriately awed by his apartment and he’s sort of awed that a woman like her is still single.
The gala itself is a Hale Publishing event, an annual dinner to highlight their bestselling authors and honor some of the work done that year. The entire company covers more than just the novelists that make them the most profit—they have magazines and literature reviews, textbooks and nonfiction, as well as various journals. But this event is really for the fancy names, the people who sit down with talk show hosts and sell their books to a wide audience; most years they host the party in New York, because that’s where their main offices are, but this year Peter has thrown them a bone (or punished them) by hosting the party in San Francisco.
The limo that he and Braeden slip into that evening is already populated with Erica and Boyd, as well as Stiles and his date—a stunning redhead wearing a pale blue dress and matching heels. Derek doubletakes, more than a little shocked that a woman like that would give a college student the time of day. She certainly can’t have any trouble finding lovers her own age. (But maybe that’s the point. Maybe the fact that Stiles was young, was her student, made up part of the appeal.) Stiles doesn’t look half bad himself, hair molded into something approximating a style, wearing a dark suit that fits him perfectly; no doubt Erica sent him to be fitted for it weeks ago.
“Derek,” Stiles says, “this is Lydia Martin. Lydia, Derek Hale.”
“Lovely to meet you,” Lydia says, offering her hand to shake, which Derek does.
Derek introduces his date—“Braeden Marshall. Braeden, you know Erica already. Vernon Boyd. And—Stiles.”
“Just Stiles?” Braeden asks with a laugh.
“The whole name’s a mouthful,” Stiles dismisses. “Thanks for letting us ride along. I haven’t been in a limo since prom night.”
“Of course,” Derek says with a shrug. “It’s wasted on just us.”
“We’re stopping to get Peter from his hotel too,” Erica says. “And then to the museum.”
The gala is inside the SFMOMA, which means at least there will be something to do when Derek wants to avoid socializing. The ride itself is already sort of a nightmare for Derek, who didn’t really realize how awkward it would be to go on a triple date with his employees. To be fair, he doesn’t feel awkward around Erica and Boyd—just Stiles. His 22-year-old assistant Stiles, who has a casual arm slung around the back of his date’s seat, a date who has to be at least thirty-five, maybe forty years old. (Not that she looks her age. Derek can just see it in the smile-lines on her face, evidence of her years. She’s objectively beautiful, and in the right light Derek would probably assume she was still in her twenties.) For some weird reason, Derek feels—off. About the whole thing. Not just about Stiles but about Braeden too, about being with Braeden in front of Stiles. It makes no sense, he knows, but it’s a weird feeling he doesn’t know how to parse. It’s sort of a feeling of insecurity, uncertainty. And he doesn’t know why or what it’s directed toward exactly, but it feels wrong. Feels weird.
Peter is an interesting addition to the mix, him and the gray-haired man he’s brought along as his date; Peter is always joyful and talkative, and his date is the same. He speaks with a French accent, peppering his English with various French words, and he wears a big smile, one hand firm on Peter’s leg for the whole ride.
At the museum, Derek keeps his left arm around Braeden while he leaves his right free to shake hands. He does the social thing, says hello to everyone he’s supposed to greet, and then gratefully accepts Stiles’ offer to show him to their table.
“Appetizers are going around for another twenty,” Stiles tells him, beckoning a waiter over. “Then they start dinner. You give your spiel during the second course. Peter speaks during dessert. Then everybody gets to get drunk. Hi, there,” Stiles says cheerily to the waiter, pulling a bill out of his pocket, “can we get a round of whatever the top shelf bourbon is?”
“How many?” the waiter asks, happily accepting the cash tip.
“For the table,” Stiles says, “so eight. Actually, I’m not drinking—seven.”
“You can drink,” Derek says with a frown.
“I’m working,” Stiles dismisses. “Seven glasses. No ice.”
Derek rolls his eyes and tells the waiter, “Tell the bartender we’ll buy the bottle. Just bring it quickly.”
“It’s an open bar, sir,” the waiter informs them.
“Then I’ve already bought the bottle,” Derek sighs.
Stiles laughs gently. “Don’t mind him, he’s cranky because he’s been dieting to fit into his suit.” He lays a friendly—or more than friendly—hand on the waiter’s elbow. “Hurry back, won’t you?”
The waiter disappears and Stiles holds out the seat beside Derek for Lydia; Derek is briefly disappointed that he doesn’t get to sit next to Stiles, but it makes sense. Dinner parties always call for boy-girl-boy-girl seating. Luckily, Derek isn’t expected to make small talk with her, as Peter and his date join them quickly.
“How did a thing as lovely as you meet my nephew?” Peter asks Braeden with a leering grin.
Braeden laughs charmingly, the sort of flirtatious response she’s socially expected to give. “Just lucky, I suppose.”
“Is this the first date?”
“The third,” Braeden shares, laying a hand on Derek’s knee. “I can hardly believe he’s still single.”
“Me neither,” Peter says with a smirk. “But you know how divorce can weigh on a person.”
“Peter,” Derek warns.
Appropriately chastised, Peter shrugs a wordless apology. “Of course,” he says with an acquiescent gesture. “That’s more fourth date material, isn’t it?”
They’re rescued by Lydia clearing her throat and asking, “Braeden, what do you do?”
“I’m a court clerk,” Braeden says, “at the civic center downtown.”
Lydia makes an impressed noise. “The supreme court,” she surmises. “That’s quite impressive. Where did you do your law degree?”
“Stanford, ages ago. Berkeley undergrad.”
“Naturally.”
“And you?” Braeden asks.
“I teach,” Lydia says, just as modest as Braeden apparently. “Early modern through mid-century literature.”
“At Stanford,” Stiles chimes in. “What a coincidence.”
“Such intelligent women,” Peter all but coos. “I can’t believe they would waste their time with men like us.”
“How long have you two been together?” Braeden asks, gesturing between Lydia and Stiles.
“Oh, no,” Stiles laughs, “we’re not—we’re just friends. Derek wouldn’t let me come stag, so Lydia graciously agreed to keep me company.”
“And I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to meet the Hales,” Lydia says, turning her charming smile on Derek. “I taught a contemporary literature elective a few years ago and my syllabus pulled extensively from your fiction magazine. I’m a great admirer of your catalog.”
“Kind of you to say,” Derek acknowledges.
Stiles shakes his head. “No, she’s telling the truth. She offers extra credit if students submit a story to the youth fiction journal.”
“I do,” Lydia affirms, smiling fondly at Stiles. “But Stiles is still the only one of my students actually to be published in it.”
Derek is embarrassed that he’s shocked. “You’re a writer?” The question comes out before he can modulate his surprise, and he winces at his own disbelief. God, he’s such a fucking jerk. Stiles has been working for him for over ten months and Derek had no idea.
“He’s a wonderful writer,” Lydia says, before Stiles can respond. “I assumed that’s how he got the job.”
Derek’s skin is hot, tight; he always blushes from his neck up, and he can feel his hairline heating with something like shame. “Honestly, I didn’t hire him. Erica did.”
“Derek is too busy to look at resumes,” Stiles excuses, not sounding bothered in the least. “I was an intern at the fiction magazine when Erica plucked me from obscurity.”
“Hm,” Lydia says.
Derek is saved from further embarrassment by the return of the waiter and the arrival of bourbon. The wine on the table is fine, but Derek wants to drink. Stiles thanks the waiter profusely and sends him away when he offers to pour from the bottle himself. Instead, Stiles busies himself with pouring generously into the glasses and distributing them around the table, ignoring Derek when he offers to take over.
Erica and Boyd arrive just in time for the announcement that dinner is about to be served. Derek breathes a little easier with them around, people he trusts implicitly, people who know him better than probably anyone else on the planet. With Erica to keep Stiles occupied, and with Peter distracted by his date, Derek feels less anxious about focusing on Braeden. This is sort of a date, after all.
It’s—harder than Derek thought. To focus on her. To forget about the other people at the table, the other people in the room. Even when he’s pretending to listen to her talk, his mind is…drifting.
Stiles is a writer. Stiles is apparently a published writer, in one of the magazines Derek is responsible for. Which means Derek should’ve seen his writing at some point, not that he has the time to read everything they publish. He wonders how long ago it was, what he wrote about, if he’s still writing something now…
The evening isn’t a waste, in the end. He gives his speech—which was mostly written for him by Erica—and shakes some hands, poses for an appropriate number of photos, and then he feels no qualms about drinking. Since he bought the bottle.
-0-
In the office on Monday, during the afternoon when Derek is meant to be catching up on his to-do list, he opens the digital archive of the youth fiction journal and searches Stiles’ last name. (His first name is long and confusing—Derek couldn’t hazard a guess on how to pronounce it.)
There are three submissions, and one acceptance. It’s sorted under the category “contemporary horror/thriller,” which immediately piques his interest. It’s hard for Derek to imagine Stiles writing something scary. In his mind, Stiles is just sort of…goofy. Unserious. He works hard, of course, but he always has a joke in his back pocket, and he’s full of sarcasm, of wit. Derek could imagine him penning the story for, like, a graphic novel. Or maybe on the writing staff of a sitcom. But horror?
The blinds that obscure Derek’s office are always closed in the afternoon, a purposeful detail meant to help him focus. But it also gives him enough cover to click into Stiles’ story without fear of being watched.
Derek sort of expects…undergrad writing. Even though he knows their youth fiction journal publishes impressive stuff, he imagines that there will be some purple prose, some annoying exposition, maybe even some cringe-worthy dialogue. But there isn’t any of that. It’s a short and intense story about a demon haunting a family through two generations, possessing and killing a mother before returning to haunt her teenage son years later. It’s not only gripping—it’s genuinely terrifying. Derek can feel his heart race as the story reaches its climax, his breath catching; he feels completely sucked into the story, the narration of the teenager who’s losing time and waking up with blood on his hands. He scrolls and scrolls, devouring every word, and when it ends, his whole chest feels sort of—hollow. Empty. Starkly cold.
“Fuck,” he exhales. “That’s it?”
There’s no resolution. No happily ever after. No demon smiting or exorcism. Just a boy being haunted. Finishing it feels like waking up in the middle of a dream—a nightmare. Relief but also terror. Fear mixed with gratitude. It’s more feeling than a story has evoked from Derek in…a while.
Derek is reaching for the intercom before he’s made the conscious decision to do so. “Stiles, come in here please.”
It takes only a handful of seconds for Stiles to push in, tablet in hand. “What’s up, boss man? Is the Institute pile getting overwhelming? I can have the editors go back and triage—”
“Do you only write short fiction?”
Stiles looks up from the screen in front of him, eyes wide. “Uh. I don’t know if I understand the question.”
“A novel,” Derek clarifies. “Are you planning on writing longform fiction like a novel?”
“I don’t have any plans,” Stiles says, frowning. “I really like this job, you know. I’m not trying to do anything else.”
Derek is gratified to hear that, even though he thinks it might be a poor decision on Stiles’ part. “I’m not trying to get rid of you,” Derek assures him. “But if you wanted to work in one of the fiction offices, I could have Erica—”
“No,” Stiles cuts him off, shaking his head shortly. “No, thank you. I’m very happy here.”
“Okay,” Derek says. “If you change your mind, you can tell me. I’d be sorry to lose you, but—you have to think about your career.”
The corner of Stiles’ mouth tugs up into a smirk. “I think my career is going just fine,” Stiles says. “Not many young writers get daily face-to-face meetings with Derek Hale.”
Derek’s stomach twists, not unpleasantly. If he didn’t know better, he might think Stiles was flirting with him. “The story we published—your story. It’s…really something.”
Stiles’ mouth falls open, cheeks coloring. “You read it?”
“I was curious,” Derek admits. “I don’t think I’ve ever read anything like it.” At the blank look on Stiles’ face, he adds, “That’s a compliment.”
“Oh. Um. Thank you. That’s really—thanks.” He shifts his weight nervously, tapping a finger against his tablet. “You should be working, you know. If you don’t want to help narrow down the Institute submissions, I’ll tell the editors to figure it out on their own.”
“We tend to only hire editors with graduate degrees,” Derek says, ignoring his point about the work Derek should be doing. (He’s the boss, he can do whatever he wants.) “Have you thought about getting a master’s? USC has a program we like—we also hire often from Berkeley.”
“I’m still crawling out from under some hefty student debt,” Stiles tells him with a casual air. “Grad school is gonna have to wait.” He gestures pointedly to the pile on Derek’s desk. “Yes or no on these?”
“What did you do during your internship? Your responsibilities.”
There’s a small look of exasperation in Stiles’ eyes. “I mostly proofread. Sometimes I helped triage submissions for the editors. I wrote a couple of blurbs, summaries. Stuff like that.”
“Great,” Derek says, nodding toward the pile. “You can rank these for me then.”
“Me?”
“You,” Derek affirms. “You know what they’re looking for, right?”
“But I don’t know what you’re looking for,” Stiles says, frowning slightly. “I appreciate the vote of confidence, but there’s a reason you read through the Institute submissions.”
“And I’ll read the final product for approval,” Derek says. “You read them, pick your top ten, and write me a cover letter. Okay?”
If Stiles feels overburdened by the assignment, it doesn’t show on his face. He looks stunned, definitely, but he’s smiling as he steps forward to accept the pile of submissions. “Can I take them home with me?”
“Of course,” Derek says, nodding. “But you don’t need to work outside of work hours.”
“I want to,” Stiles assures him. “Thanks for, you know, trusting me.”
“By Friday,” Derek says.
“For sure. By Friday.” Stiles hesitates at the door, a bounty of paper in his arms. “You really liked the story? My story?”
Just thinking about it makes Derek’s heart clench in his chest. “It was very impressive,” Derek tells him, and it’s the truth. “It was—effective. Horrifying.”
Stiles’ smile is vaguely pained, a sort of sadness in his gaze. “Thank you. That means a lot to me, you know.”
Derek nods. “Go read. You’re on a deadline.”
-0-
By the end of Stiles’ first year at Hale Publishing, he has a lot more responsibilities than when he started. He doesn’t complain, though. Derek notices. Derek notices a lot of things.