She laughed. God, he liked working with young people. “So, why I’m here,” he said.
“Yes?”
“I want to put an access point in the second-floor window and around back of the shop. Your boss owns the building, right?”
“Yeah, but I really don’t think I can explain all this stuff to him—”
“I don’t need you to—I just need you to introduce me to him. I’ll do all the explaining.”
She blushed a little. “I don’t know, Abe… ” She trailed off.
“Is that a problem?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know.” She looked distressed.
Suddenly he was at sea. He’d felt like he was in charge of this interaction, like he understood what was going on. He’d carefully rehearsed what he was going to say and what Natalie was likely to say, and now she was, what, afraid to introduce him to her boss? Because why? Because the boss was an ogre? Then she would have pushed back harder when he told her to talk to him about the rental records. Because she was shy? Natalie wasn’t shy. Because—
“I’ll do it,” she said. “Sorry. I was being stupid. It’s just—you come on a little strong sometimes. My boss, I get the feeling that he doesn’t like it when people come on strong with him.”