Page 1 of His Wall

ONE

JULIAN

Someone had been in my office.

I stood in the doorway with a coffee cooling in my hand and looked around the room one more time, because the first pass had felt like a bad joke. I wasn’t the most organized person, but even I could tell when someone had rifled through my things.

I had a system. The stack of signed letters sat too straight against the desk's edge, leaning the wrong direction — I left everything slanted left. The keyboard had been pushed two inches toward the monitor.

I knew because my wrists rested in the same spot on the desk's edge every morning, and that spot was empty now, the keyboard crowding into it.

I ran a hand through my hair and tilted my head at the desk like it might answer me back. I set the coffee down on the table and crossed to the door.

"Claire." I watched as she walked toward me with the notebook open against her forearm, dark hair pulled back in a low knot at the base of her skull, not a strand out of place. Cream blouse, charcoal trousers, flat black shoes. She wore a watch on her left wrist, face turned to the inside.

She came to a stop, a polite step inside the door, and I looked down at her. She cleared my shoulder by maybe 4 in., the top of her head level with the knot of my tie.

Her gray eyes met mine. "Good morning, Mr. Cross."

It had been four months, and yet she still called me Mr. Cross. I had asked her twice to call me Julian, and she agreed both times, but continued to call me Mr. Cross.

"Morning. Did you come in early today?"

"No, sir. I just arrived on time at 7:00 a.m., the same as yesterday."

"You're sure?"

"Yes, sir."

I rolled one sleeve up, then another. It gave my hands something to do.

"Someone's been in here."

She glanced past me once — desk, window, back to me — without moving her head. Then she opened the notebook a quarter-inch further, as though to give her hands the same small task mine had found.

"What makes you say so, Mr. Cross?"

"The papers are leaning the wrong way. The keyboard's been moved. The bottom drawer's closed."

"Would you like me to speak with the cleaning crew?"

"The cleaning crew doesn't touch desks."

"That's correct, sir. Per the facilities agreement, they're limited to floors, common-area surfaces, and receptacles. They're not permitted inside private offices after hours without an escort."

She said it evenly, completely, as if she were reading from a document she had already filed. I watched her face while she said it. Nothing moved. Not her mouth, not her jaw, not the small muscle at the corner of her eye.

"Right," I said. "Yeah. I know."

"Would you like me to pull the access log for the floor?"

"Can you do that?"

"I can request it from building security. They keep badge entries for ninety days."

"Sure. Do that."

"Of course, sir."