to a dip in another company's line. There was no name, just the acronym SBU. I looked at the timeline across the bottom. "Um ... three months ago they had a similar dip and then came out of it?" He frowned at me. "Sir," I added quickly, my pulse speeding up. "That was them admitting their solar technology wasn't as good as they claimed and this is us admitting the same thing but for different reasons." He turned the screen back around to face him and then looked at me. Even just sitting there in his chair he was young and vital. He was strong and he moved silently. I looked down at my notepad and readied my pen, as though I was about to write something down. I couldn't hold his gaze. Already I felt my sex heating against his chair just being near him. I felt like his scent infused the room and saturated me. "Look at me, Delilah," he said, his voice commanding. I swallowed and looked up into his eyes. "You're going to be given access to our systems as though you were me . Do you understand? I need you to follow my instructions precisely and without error. You are going to have access to a lot of sensitive material and I need to know that I can trust you. Can I trust you?" I suddenly felt see-through as though I was made of glass. My blouse was sheer white and I knew he could see my black bra beneath it. I wished I was covered in a suit of armor rather than having him sitting in front of me asking I he could trust me. "You can trust me, Sir." I said, feeling the lie slip over my tongue like it was made of lead. "Good. Now go back to your desk, I have work to do." With a wave of his hand he dismissed me and started typing on his keyboard. I stood up and walked out. In the polished surfaces in his office on the way out there were about six different views of Mr. Stone. In none of them did he look up at me walking out. With a sinking heart I left his office, the heavy doors closing behind me. I sat down at my desk and saw I had two new emails. The first was from Ms. Green telling me my security access had been upgraded to the top level. I now had access to every single part of Stone-Black. It came with three pages of various warnings about misusing information which I skipped over. I saw that it had been sent at 4:32pm. They'd upgraded my security rating before Mr. Stone had even asked me if I could be trusted? The second email was from Mr. Stone and the timestamp showed it arrived a minute ago. There was no subject line. You will hand-write "I will not be late" one hundred times and bring it to me at 5pm. Do not be late. Lines? He had given me lines? Even as I felt myself rebelling - maybe I'll make a spelling mistake. Maybe I'll take it in at 5:01 - I pulled out my yellow pad and started writing. I will not be late. I will not be late. I will not be late. * At five on the dot I rapped on the door and waited for Mr. Stone to call me in. And waited. And waited. I stood there for five minutes before I decided to push open the door. Mr. Stone sat behind his giant polished desk glaring at me with his blue-green eyes. "I have what you want. Sir," I said and waved the yellow legal pad. He seemed to snap out of a trance then and his features softened. "Come here," he commanded. I walked in, making sure to keep my eye on where I was going. No way was I going to trip over on the rug in front of him again. Even so, I was slinking just a little and swaying my hips. If this was any other man I'd fallen for at work I'd be flirting with him in the break room, finding excuses to be around him, touching him lightly on the arm and smiling, brushing my breasts against him oh so accidentally... He held out his hand for the pad. I handed it over and he looked through the pages. He was actually reading the lines and counting them! "Next time put a number at the beginning of each line," he said and handed the pad back. Next time? He was going to be assigning me lines again rather than punishing me the way he had, the