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“Open it,” Alison said.
“I can’t.”
“What do you mean you can’t? You’re the NCO, as you’re so fond of reminding me. You must have the keys.”
“It locks from the outside.”
“What?”
“There’s a lock on the inside—” I flipped it back and forth to show her— “but the key locks the door from the outside. Jack must have locked it when he left.”
“Okay. Great. So how are we supposed to get out? Is there a back exit?”
“No.”
“You’re telling me there’s only one way in or out of this place? Isn’t that against the fire code or something?”
I stared at her in amusement. “What would you know about the fire code?”
“I’m not an imbecile, Brian. There must be another way out of this building.”
“There is, but it’ll be locked too. We don’t unlock the service entrance on weekends.”
“So we’re stuck in here?”
“Of course not. I’ll call maintenance to come and let us out. It’s no big deal.”
“Fine. I’ll go wait at that desk where I was sitting.”
“You absolutely won’t,” I told her firmly. “I’m not leaving you alone in this building.”
“Brian, for God’s sake. What do you think I’m going to do, set the building on fire?”
“No, what you’re going to do is come back to my office and stay where I can keep an eye on you while I call maintenance.”
“Keep an eye on me?”
“I don’t care if you are fed,” I told her firmly. “I’m the NCO, and I’m not going to allow any civilian to be unsupervised in this building.”
I could see that she had no actual argument to offer against that. “Fine,” she said at last. “Your office, then.”
Thunder rumbled outside again, and I led her across the floor to my office. This time, she sat opposite mine without waiting to be asked and fumbled in her purse. After a moment, she pulled out a cell phone.
She made a face. “Do you have a charger? My phone is dying.”
I looked over at it. Her phone was an older model and of a different brand than mine. “I don’t have that kind,” I said.
“Damn.”
“Why don’t you carry one with you?”“I didn’t realize I was going to end up locked in the building, did I? Do you carry a phone charger everywhere you go?”
“No, but I probably would if I carried a big handbag.”
“Oh, call maintenance, will you? I want to get out of here.”
I wanted out too. Being around her was an ordeal, not just because she couldn’t seem to keep her mouth shut for more than a minute at a time.
Her hair was falling out of its neat updo, making me remember what she had looked like lying on my conference room table, fucked out and messy.
