After We Got Engaged, the Six of Us Planned One Last Trip Together Before the Wedding or 24-Hour Couple Swap novel · Chapter 17 of 24

Chapter 17: Useful, Gray

Winston's POV

My supervisor had printed the stills in color.

There were four of them on her desk, lined up with the edges square, and I admired that about her even then.

"Sit down, Winston," she said.

I sat.

"Somebody sent this to my work email at six this morning. The sender says she is a concerned friend."

"She isn't."

"I assumed. Is it you?"

I looked at the yellow window and the gray blanket, and at a green dress on the boards.

"Yes," I said.

She waited.

I have found that people who wait are the only ones worth telling the truth to, so I told her.

"It was on a weekend off. It was not on a city site and not on city time. The woman is not a contractor, not a permit holder and not in my chain of work."

"Is she a dental hygienist?"

"How do you..."

"She sent the woman's name too. She wanted to be thorough." She slid the stills into a folder. "Is it consensual?"

"Entirely."

"Then it isn't mine to care about."

"Someone is trying to use it to make me quiet," I said. "I thought you should hear that from me first."

She looked at me over her glasses for a long moment.

"In nine years you've never taken a sick day."

"No."

"Take the afternoon," she said. "And forward me every message she sends. If she contacts anyone else here, I will personally enjoy it."

I went down the stairs of the city building feeling lighter than I had in a week, and a little frightened by it.

That night Signe came to Fourth Street with a foil-covered plate.

"My mother says you need to eat," she said. "It's pot roast. She asked me to tell you it isn't a bribe."

"What is it?"

"It's a bribe."

I put it in the oven and we sat on my couch with our knees touching.

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