"You're early," Nia said from the doorway of her office.
Darian was standing at the window with his back to the room, hands in his pockets, looking at the West Loop the way people looked at things when they weren't actually seeing them. He turned when she spoke.
"You said eight," he said.
"It's seven fifty-two."
"I know."
She walked in and put her bag down and sat behind her desk with the deliberate purposefulness of someone establishing the terms of a space before a conversation began. He watched her do it without comment and then sat in the chair across from her not the one closest to the door, she noticed, but the one directly opposite. He wasn't leaving himself an easy exit either.
For a moment neither of them said anything.
"I'll start," he said.
"Please."
He leaned forward s
