Manager on Duty Chapter Nine: After Hours

← Previous Chapter | ToC | Next Chapter →

By 9:34, Gareth had reconstructed enough of the black-wrapped pallet’s history to know somebody had been careful. The original transfer from Receiving was legitimate. Everything after that was not.

At 10:16 three weeks earlier, Inventory terminal I-3 had been accessed by contractor badge C-441. Two minutes later, Victoria Kavanagh’s credentials authorised an inventory adjustment from the same terminal. Bay Six’s original seven-minute blackout began at 10:14.

Gareth printed the access log, emailed copies to Morgan and Security, and shut down the Receiving workstation.

Front pockets. Back pockets. Front pockets again.

Keys. Wallet. Phone. Pen.

He looked at the contractor number on the page. C-441. Finally, something with a name attached. He climbed the mezzanine stairs, where Victoria was waiting.

Her office door was open, and the glass overlooking Receiving was clear. She had removed her blazer and rolled her sleeves to the elbows. The warehouse beneath them had nearly emptied, leaving broad aisles of fluorescent light and long shadows between the racks.

Gareth entered and placed the printout on her desk.

“I found whoever was at I-3.”

Victoria picked it up. “Who?”

“Contractor badge C-441. Logged into the terminal at 10:16. Your authorisation was used two minutes later.”

Her eyes moved rapidly over the page. “Do we have a name?”

“Security is pulling it.”

“You sent this to them already?”

“And Morgan.”

Victoria looked at him. Gareth waited for the correction. Instead she nodded.

“Good.”

The word still hit him. That irritated him almost as much as how much he liked it. Victoria walked around the desk and opened the access report on her computer. Gareth came beside her. The contractor entry was there exactly where he had found it, buried beneath hundreds of ordinary movements.

“So someone enters Bay Six,” she said, “uses a contractor badge at Inventory, then uses my credentials.”

“And three weeks later puts the pallet back.”

“Why?”

Gareth looked at the forged record. “Maybe they weren’t hiding the pallet from you.”

Victoria turned.

“Maybe they were hiding you inside the pallet.”

Her expression sharpened. “Explain.”

“Everything points toward you. Your credentials. Your initials. Your door. If someone finds this without the original logs, it doesn’t look like theft. It looks like you manipulated inventory and then tried to hide it.”

Victoria became very still. For the first time, Gareth saw something beneath her control that looked close to fear.

“That could cost me my job.”

“Yes. Possibly more…” he added.

Victoria turned away and put both hands on the desk. “Wonderful.”

“It’s not done.”

“No, Gareth. Someone has spent three weeks manufacturing evidence with my name attached to it. I think we can safely call that somewhat fucking done.”

He stared. Victoria closed her eyes.

“What?”

“I’ve never heard you swear.”

“Treasure the occasion.”

He almost laughed.

That was enough.

Some invisible wire between them finally snapped.

Victoria laughed too, once, quietly and without humour, then pressed a hand over her face. When she lowered it, she looked less like the manager upstairs than Gareth had ever seen her.

“I hate this,” she said.

“The investigation?”

“Not knowing.”

That he understood.

Gareth leaned against the desk beside her. “We have C-441 now.”

“A contractor badge.”

“A real one.”

“Unless that was copied too.”

“Then we find out.”

Victoria looked at him. “You make everything sound manageable.”

“No. I make it sound like the next thing can be done.”

Something changed in her eyes. “There’s a difference?”

“Big one.”

She stepped closer. Gareth stopped breathing properly. They had kissed before. They had already touched enough to make pretending ridiculous. But this felt different because there was no instruction attached to a task, no checklist between them, no work problem requiring proximity.

Victoria reached for the hidden switch beneath her desk. Gareth caught her wrist, and she froze.

“Leave it.”

Her eyes dropped to his hand around her wrist. “The glass?”

“Yes.”

“People could still be downstairs.”

“Probably.”

Victoria searched his face. “And you’re comfortable with that?”

“No.”

That surprised her.

Gareth released her wrist. “That’s why I want it left clear.”

Something hot moved through her expression.

“You’re becoming difficult.”

“You noticed.”

“I noticed before you did.”

She stepped into him and kissed him.

There was nothing careful about it.

Gareth caught her waist as her mouth opened against his. All the weeks of glances, corrections, darkened glass and unfinished moments collapsed at once. Victoria pushed him backwards until his hips struck the edge of her desk, then kissed him harder.

He pulled away just enough to breathe. “Victoria.”

“What?”

“I stayed because of the investigation.”

Her face changed. Then he tightened his hands around her waist.

“I’m still here because of you.”

Her breath caught. “Say that again.”

“No.”

Her eyebrows rose. Gareth smiled.

“I said it once.”

“You enjoy testing your manager?”

“I’m not talking to my manager.”

Victoria stared at him for several seconds before stepping backwards. Then she pointed to the floor in front of her.

“Kneel.”

Every sound in the warehouse seemed to disappear. Gareth looked at the place she indicated. Then at her. This was not holding eye contact during a correction. Not hands on glass. Not a kiss that could still be explained as two people losing control.

This had shape. Meaning. His pulse hammered. Victoria did not repeat herself.

“Is that Victoria asking?” he said.

“Yes.”

“Not my manager?”

Her voice lowered. “Not your manager.”

Gareth went to his knees, and Victoria inhaled sharply. For all her control, she had not been ready for what the sight would do to her. Neither had he. To most, the position should have embarrassed him. Instead, something inside Gareth settled with almost frightening ease. He looked up at her and felt no weakness in it.

Victoria stepped closer until the toes of her shoes nearly touched his knees.

“Where are we at?”

“Green.”

She placed two fingers beneath his chin and lifted his face slightly.

“Still?”

“Yes.”

Her thumb crossed his lower lip.

Gareth closed his eyes for half a second.

“Look at me.”

He did. The effect on Victoria was immediate. Her breathing changed.

“So obedient,” she whispered.

Gareth’s hand closed around her calf.

“When I choose to be.”

Victoria smiled. There it was. Something hungrier than Victoria the manager would have smiled.

“Good answer.”

She moved between his knees, and Gareth slid both hands slowly up the backs of her legs, stopping at the hem of her skirt. He looked up before moving farther.

Victoria understood the question.

“Yes.”

His hands travelled beneath the fabric, tracing warm skin until her breath caught. Victoria’s fingers tightened in his hair.

“Careful,” she whispered.

“You don’t want careful.”

“No.”

Gareth rose. Victoria barely had time to react before he caught her around the waist and lifted her onto the edge of the desk. A stack of reports slid sideways. Her tablet nearly followed.

“Gareth.”

He stepped between her knees and kissed her again. Victoria wrapped one leg around him and pulled him closer. Her control finally cracked enough for Gareth to feel how badly she had wanted this. Her hands moved beneath his shirt, palms against his back, fingernails dragging lightly over his skin while his mouth moved from hers to the side of her throat.

She made a sound she clearly had not intended to make.

Gareth stopped. Victoria opened her eyes.

“What?”

He smiled against her skin.

“Nothing.”

“You’re insufferable.”

“You trained me.”

“I absolutely did not.”

He kissed her again before she could finish, but then a noise sounded somewhere below. Both of them froze. A metal door closing.

Victoria looked toward the glass. It was still clear.

Gareth remained between her legs, her skirt pushed higher than either of them could reasonably explain, her hands beneath his shirt.

For three seconds neither moved. Then Victoria began to laugh. Quietly at first, forehead dropping against his shoulder. Gareth laughed with her.

“This is a terrible idea,” she whispered.

“Probably.”

“We could both lose our jobs.”

“Possibly.”

“You’re remarkably calm about that.”

“I’m currently distracted.”

She bit back another laugh and pushed him away just enough to fix her skirt. Gareth straightened his shirt. Victoria looked at him.

The room had changed, and so had they.

“This cannot happen again,” she said.

Gareth raised an eyebrow.

Victoria sighed. “Fine. It cannot happen again like this.”

“That sounds more believable.”

She pointed at him. “Tomorrow. We talk.”

“About?”

“Rules.”

Gareth’s amusement faded. Victoria looked toward the clear glass, then back at him.

“What happens when I ask you to kneel. What happens when you say no. What happens if either of us wants something the other doesn’t. And what happens when Victoria and Gareth walk into this room instead of manager and employee.”

Gareth considered her. “That sounds complicated.”

“It will be.”

He picked up the contractor report from her desk. “Good.”

Victoria looked at him. “Why good?”

“Because complicated things need rules.”

He walked toward the door.

“Gareth.”

He turned.

Victoria was still sitting on the edge of the desk, flushed, hair disordered, control slowly rebuilding itself around her.

Her eyes dropped deliberately to the floor where he had knelt.

“Tomorrow,” she said.

Gareth understood. “Tomorrow.”

He left the office with the glass still clear. Behind him, Victoria did not darken it.