Chapter 12: What I Didn't Say

On Sunday morning I unlocked the empty floor under Tobias's offices, and a dozen people were waiting outside the door with cardboard boxes.

"We quit," said the woman from the plotter. "Last night, by text. All of us."

"Every one of you?"

"The receptionist is downstairs parking the car."

I stood in the doorway with the key in my hand and could not say a word.

They filed past me, carrying monitors and coffee machines and a plant that someone had stolen from the lobby of Lowell Design.

The young drafter set up his screen on the long table where Tobias had kissed me.

I looked away from that table.

"Miss Arrington," the older woman said, setting down her box. "When do we get paid?"

"Friday," I said.

She nodded, satisfied, and went to find an outlet.

I went into the little glass office at the back and shut the door and opened my banking app.

I had been avoiding it for a week.

The balance in my checking account was two thousand one hundred and fourteen dollars.

I read the number again.

The savings account that had held my father's money was marked closed.

The payroll for twelve people for a month was just over sixty thousand dollars.

I put the phone face down on the desk, and I pressed both palms against my eyes.

"Coffee," said Tobias.

He was standing in the glass door with two paper cups, and I had not heard him come in.

"You didn't have to knock."

"I knocked twice." He set a cup in front of me. "You looked like you were solving something."

"Just a lot of drawings."

He watched me for a moment.

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