Monday morning, I’m at my desk by eight fifteen.
My desk sits outside Zane’s office on the forty-fourth floor, positioned at an angle that gives me a sightline to both the elevator bank and his door. The floor is quieter than the ones below, less traffic, more deliberate movement from the few people who have business up here.
I’ve been here two days and already understand that this floor operates on a different register from the rest of the building.
I’m pulling up the calendar system when Roman appears.
He does this. Materializes. I have not once seen him come off an elevator or emerge from a stairwell. He’s simply not there, and then he is, standing at the edge of my desk with a leather folder and an expression that suggests he has already decided how this conversation is going to go.
“The courier package for the Mercer address,” he says. “Needs to go this morning before eleven. There’s also a notarized letter at the building on Fifty-Third that requires collection, front desk, give them this reference.” He sets a card on my desk. “And Mr. Volkov needs a specific bottle from a place on the Upper East Side. The name and address are in the folder.” He places the folder beside the card and steps back.
“Roman,” I say.
“The courier closes at ten forty-five. You’ll need to move.”
“I need to speak with Mr. Volkov this morning.”
“He has calls until noon.” He says it the way people say things that are not open for discussion. “The errands first.” He’s already walking away.
I look at the folder. I look at the closed door across the floor, with its brushed-steel handle and the silence behind it. I pick up the folder, collect my bag, and go.
The Mercer address takes forty minutes with traffic. The building on Fifty-Third adds another thirty. The wine merchant on the Upper East Side is a narrow room that smells of oak and climate control, and the man behind the counter treats retrieving a single bottle as a minor ceremony. I do not have time for that today.
I’m back at Volkov Holdings at twelve fourteen.
The elevator opens on forty-four, and I walk directly to Zane’s office without stopping at my desk. I’ve been thinking about page fourteen for eleven hours. I have the document in my bag. I have had no response from HR. I’ve run three errands on three hours of sleep, and I’m done waiting for a convenient moment for this conversation.
His office door is not fully closed. I don’t knock. I push it open.
The office is large, with a desk at the far end, dark wood and wide, the city arranged behind it through a window that runs most of the length of the wall. There’s a sitting area to the left, with two chairs and a low table, and a separate door on the right side of the room that stands half-open. Bookshelves line one wall, all the books used, no decorative spines. The whole room is arranged in a way that is not suited to the impression it makes.
He’s not at his desk.
The sound comes from beyond the half-open door on the right.
Low. Rough. A grunt and then a breath and then my name, in a voice that has become more familiar in the last two days.
Celine.
I stand exactly where I am.
4
ZANE
The door.
Four seconds. That is what I give myself. Belt. Button. The side room is small, a washroom, a closet, and a narrow bench I have never used, and I take those four seconds with the door closed and my back against the wall, and I breathe out through my nose once before I open it.
She’s standing in the center of my office. Bag on her shoulder. A folder gripped in her left hand. She has been working in this building for two days, and now she’s standing in the middle of my office like she owns the floor, and the expression on her face is not the one I’ve been watching for forty-eight hours. The composed, observant expression she wears at her desk is gone. What is underneath it is considerably less manageable.
She heard me. I know she heard me because she’s not asking questions. She’s waiting. Her jaw is set, and her eyes are on me.
I walk to my desk and sit down. I’m not going to address what she heard. Addressing it means naming it, and naming it meanswe are having a conversation I have no intention of having. I set my pen to the side, and I look at her, and wait.
She crosses to the desk and puts the folder down between us. The document is open to page fourteen. “Explain this,” she says.
“You’ve read it.”
