Page 69 of In Plain Sight

MrNiceGuy: goodnight

Sinbin: goodnight

The green light under his name went out. I exited the app and put my phone on the couch as the past few days caught up with me and a wave of exhaustion hit like a ton of bricks.

Maybe it was a good thing I had the weekend off and no plans. I felt better after talking with Nice. Nothing had been solved, and I was still confused as fuck, but now I didn’t feel so alone.

Working with Zander tomorrow would have been a nice distraction, but I was still a mess and I had a feeling that my brain wasn’t going to let me chill for long. The last thing I needed was to have a breakdown at work or a panic attack.

With a weary sigh, I climbed to my feet. Might as well try to get some sleep before my second wind kicked in and I spent the night spiraling.

11

LUKA

“Do you have a minute?”

I looked up from the drawer in my toolbox I was rearranging to find Nate a few feet from my workstation.

The shop was ghostly quiet today, thanks to it being Thanksgiving weekend. We closed on Thanksgiving Day so everyone could celebrate with their families, but we were open our regular hours for the rest of the weekend.

Yesterday had been so dead that we’d spent most of our shift doing inventory and other tasks to pass the time, and today wasn’t much better. I’d already rearranged my toolbox once since I clocked in, and we still had about an hour before it was time to start our closing routine.

“Yeah, of course.” I closed the drawer to my toolbox. “Is everything okay?”

“Everything’s fine,” he said. “Let’s go to the office for a second.”

Nate’s smile was genuine, and his demeanor didn’t suggest anything was wrong, but my heart started pounding in my chest as I followed him to the back office.

I snuck a quick look at Zander as we passed his workstation. He smiled and gave me a reassuring nod, like he could sense that I was freaking out. That little smile helped calm some of my nerves, and I felt almost calm as I stepped into the office.

“Do you want me to close the door?” I asked Nate.

He nodded and perched on the edge of his desk.

I nudged the door shut with my foot, my whole body going on high alert like I was expecting a serial killer to jump out from behind one of the giant desks in the room.

“Relax, Luka,” Nate said in his dad voice. “You’re not in trouble. I just wanted to talk to you about a few things.”

“Sorry.” I shot him a weak smile and tried to shake off my anxiety.

“Nothing to apologize for. I bet it kind of feels like you’re being called to the principal’s office.”

I huffed out a laugh. “Yeah, a little bit. Only every time I got called into the principal’s office, it was because I was getting in trouble.”

He chuckled. “Actually, same with me. That wasn’t the best analogy.”

I couldn’t picture Nate being the type to get in trouble, not now that I knew him. Nate was a walking contradiction, the same with his brother. He was six-four and built like a bodybuilder with huge arms, a massive chest, and legs that could double as tree trunks. Add in his stoic nature and the confident way he carried himself, and he gave off an air of being one scary motherfucker.

But in reality, he was one of the kindest people I’d ever met. He took care of everyone around him, and the only time I’d seen him even raise his voice was when he was protecting someone.

“I just wanted to check in and see how you’re doing.” He crossed his arms over his chest, the bottom of a tribal tattoo on his bicep peeking out from under his t-shirt.

“I’m good.” I clasped my hands in front of me, then shoved them into the pockets of my coveralls, not sure what to do with them.

“Relax. You’re not in trouble,” he said again. “You’ve been here for just over three months now. This is just a routine check-in we do with all our hires to make sure you’re settling in and see if there’s anything we can do to make things easier for you. And to see if you have any complaints or suggestions.”

“This is so not what I’m used to,” I said to try and explain my weirdness. “Getting called into the boss’s office has always been a bad thing at every other job I’ve had. My brain is still getting used to the idea that you’re not like them.”

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