Chapter 5
He didn't ask it like he had before. Not "Margo? What happened?" like he was trying to place me. This time it was flat and direct.
"What happened last night?" he said.
We were standing by the blue rack under that switch with the red indicator. The light buzzed faintly overhead. I'd pulled his coat tighter around me and got both feet into my heels even though one still slipped. My mouth was dry.
I had the story ready. I'd rehearsed it on the floor before he found me, the edited version that sounded reasonable and didn't ask for anything.
"My car broke down," I said. "On the highway by the gas station. I missed the last bus and the diner closed early. I just needed somewhere out of the wind. I didn't mean to — I saw the side door wasn't latched and I thought I could wait till morning."
He listened without interrupting. His arms were crossed, silver watch catching the hard white light. He didn't nod to be polite. He just looked at me and then at the coat and then back at my face.
"Which gas station?" he asked.
"The one on County Road 9," I said. "By the truck stop."
"What's wrong with the car?"
I swallowed. "It overheated. I left it on the shoulder. I was going to call in the morning when the shop opened."
It sounded plausible enough. It was the kind of thing that happened to people. Car trouble, missed bus, cold night. No big drama, no reason to get anyone else involved. I kept my eyes on his so he wouldn't look at my hands. My hands were shaking and I pressed them into the wool.
He took a step toward the office door and flipped the switch. The red indicator clicked off and one of the far overheads thumped on. The warehouse got brighter down the main aisle. Blue and orange racks stretched back, all those cardboard boxes stacked neat on pallets.
"Parking lot cameras run all night," he said. "They cover the lot and the side entrance. And the dock."
I didn't say anything.
"You took the coat from the hook by the office," he said. He said it calmly, not accusing. "It's mine. I leave it there in winter."
I clutched it tighter without meaning to. "I'm sorry. I was cold. I'll put it back."
"You can keep it on," he said. "There's no car outside. Not in the lot. Not on the street cameras either. I checked before I came down the aisle."
The air felt thinner. The hard light made everything too clear — the concrete dust on my skirt, the scuff on my beige heel, the way his coat smelled faintly like warehouse cardboard and clean laundry.
"I walked from the highway," I said quickly. "I didn't drive in here."
He tilted his head just a little. He wasn't trying to trap me. He was just checking the facts against what I was giving him.
"You were asleep when I found you," he said. "Before midnight. The shift ended at eleven-thirty. Jensen locked up. If you'd walked from County Road 9 after the bus, you'd have gotten here after twelve."
I felt my face get hot. I had forgotten about the shift. Of course there'd been people here. I'd heard the forklift beeping in my half-sleep and thought I dreamed it, then pulled the coat over my head.
"I might have the time wrong," I said. My voice went quiet. "It was cold. I don't know exactly when I came in."
He didn't press. He let the silence sit there between us. The overhead lamp hummed. Somewhere down the aisle a heater kicked on with a soft click.
"I get it," he said finally. "You don't want to say why you needed a floor to sleep on. You're trying to give me a reason that doesn't make me have to do anything about it."
I stared at him. That was exactly it, and hearing him say it out loud made my chest hurt.
"It's not that I don't believe your car had trouble," he said. "It's that it doesn't explain why you were already asleep before the building cleared out. Means you were here while we were still working."
He wasn't angry. That was the strange part. He sounded tired and careful, like he was trying not to scare me again.
"I can let the car thing stand for now if you need it to," he said. "But we have cameras and I have to log who was in the building overnight. For insurance. I can review it with you or I can review it alone tomorrow. Your call."
May you like
My throat tightened. The lie hadn't collapsed completely. He was giving me room to keep it, but he'd made it clear he knew there was more underneath. And he'd put the next choice on me, not on the footage.
I pulled the coat around me and didn't answer yet. I could hear my own breathing again, slow and shallow, the way it had been when I was lying on the concrete pretending to be invisible.
