Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
CONSTANCE
Other than almost running into Creed this morning, the day has gone by without issues.
I spent my morning sorting mail, delivering it to each floor, saving the executive level for that sweet forty-five minute period when I knew he would be out of his office.
Even his assistant somehow managed to escape my presence.
In her absence, I quickly slipped into his office, placed the stack of letters on the edge of his desk, and got the hell out of there.
I make my way back to the mailroom, pushing the now empty cart ahead of me.
My stomach growls, my hunger no longer tamed by the granola bar I had mid-morning.
The hum of printers, the distant ding of elevators, and the ringing of phones surround me as I quicken my steps, eager to take a bite of the sandwich waiting for me.
My lunch will be shorter today since I need to leave early to take Chance to his physical therapy appointment.
I finally exhale as I open the door to the familiar comfort of the mailroom. I put the cart back in its spot, neat and orderly, just like it should be, and quickly move to the computer to punch in my code, logging out of the system.
My eyes scan the room as I sit down at my desk and open the sandwich bag and chips.
Nothing has changed in the time I was out.
The walls are still the neutral shade of beige that screams for a little speck of color to be added.
The same industrial shelving labeled by floor and department.
The same scent of paper, toner, and stale coffee that clings to everything.
Now that I don’t have work to consume my time, or the fear of running into Morgan Creed, I can relax.
I pull out my phone and take a few minutes to indulge in my quiet obsession, Monopoly Go.
Currently I’m enraged at my racing partners and their lack of playing when their rating in the game is clearly higher than mine.
At this point, we’re never going to win.
The only way that would even be possible is if I buy dice, and I don’t have the extra money for that.
Before I know it, my lunch is over and I need to get back to work. It never ends. Internal and external mail never stops flowing through my office.
Stepping over to the receiving area, I don my gloves and get to work. One by one, I check the internal and external mail and begin sorting to the correct floor, then organize it by the person receiving it.
Floor three—Finance.
Floor five—Legal.
Floor eight—Operations and Project Management.
I move quickly but efficiently, scanning names, matching barcodes, stamping logs. At this point, it’s muscle memory, born from repetition and necessity. It gives my mind the time to drift, as it often does, to my sweet boy, Chance.
Did he eat his snack this morning? Did I remember to sign the updated therapy authorization form? Did the clinic say they got the authorization for Friday’s speech appointment, or do I need to get on the phone with the insurance company and light a fire under their ass?
I’m just about to place a thick envelope into the floor eight bin when something snags my attention.
The seal on it’s broken. It shouldn’t be.
That alone isn’t unheard of. It’s fairly common for mail to become damaged in the sorting machines, or by overzealous clerks at distribution hubs—but protocol is very clear.
Broken seals required logging, verification, and rerouting if anything is off.
But most importantly, they’re to be marked as such and re-sealed.
The receiver of the mail item needs to know that the item was compromised in some way.
I hold the envelope in my hand as if it might bite me if given the chance. It’s heavier than most. The paper stock is dense, expensive. The kind that doesn’t bend easily. Most likely why the seal damage happened. My eyes move over to the routing label.
Nocturne Enterprise: Black Tier
My stomach tightens.Dread settles deep.
Black Tier means it should be delivered directly to Morgan Creed. There’s a very specific protocol for Black Tier packages. It’s supposed to be scanned, logged and hand-delivered to Mr. Creed, and never touch a sorting tray. So why is it here?
There has to be a mistake. I double-check everything again. The label clearly says Black Tier, but then it shouldn’t have been dropped in with all the regular mail. My pulse races. This is a huge mistake, and I need to correct it. Find out what happened, and why it ended up here.
I scan the barcode and pull up the digital log on my terminal.
Sure enough, the system shows a temporary mis-route and a wrong labeling—human error flagged at intake.
It’s not something I normally handle, but since it's logged wrong, I just need to make sure it makes it to the correct location. Then I’ll make sure it gets delivered.
Procedure mandates that any damaged or compromised executive correspondence should be verified for recipient accuracy before resealing.
That’s how mistakes multiply—by people assuming the system knew better than it did.
My fingers hesitate at the edge of the envelope, a nagging feeling in my gut that this mistake I’ve found is going to come back to bite me in the ass.
“Get it together, Constance. You just need to open it enough to confirm where it really needs to go, reseal the envelope, log the reroute and deliver it.”
I grasp the edge of the paper with my fingers and pull it out just enough to see the name. That's all I need.
My eyes drop to the header, praying the Black Tier label’s incorrect and it merely needs to be delivered to an executive, preferably not Morgan Creed.
The first line isn’t a name. It’s a bolded classification stamp, stark against the white page.
NON-ATTRIBUTION RECOVERY
MINOR
CIVIL AUTHORITY BYPASS APPROVED
I inhale sharply.
Below it, another line—colder somehow.
My mind focuses on the phrase, turning it over like a stone with sharp edges. I don’t know what it means—not precisely—but that little voice in my brain, the one that holds my moral code, screams that this isn’t good.
My hand trembles. I know I should just stop here, seal the envelope, log it and be done with it, but I don’t. I pull the paper out further, letting my eyes drop lower and reading more.
FAMILY NOTIFICATION: WAIVED
“No,” I whisper, barely audible over the hum of the conveyor belt. This has to be a joke. Something concocted by Morgan Creed himself to assess the integrity of his employees.
I stay frozen, just staring at the words, my brain scrambling to process a way that they sound less terrible than they’re. Maybe I’m just clueless to business jargon, and it means something else other than what I’m thinking.
I just need to know. I reach in my pocket and pull out my phone, going right to the search bar on the browser. I quickly type the phrase asking what it means in layman’s terms.
The result that pops up makes me feel sick.
Non-attribution recovery: retrieval conducted without legal record or traceable authority.
Civil authority bypass: law enforcement deliberately excluded from the operation.
Post-recovery disposition at client discretion: subject not returned to public system.
Non-attribution recoveries, the article explains, are conducted outside public systems. No police involvement. No court record. No mandatory reunification. Once the operation is complete, the subject effectively disappears from the official narrative.
“Oh my God,” I whisper, shaking my head, my hand going to my heart as I feel an intense pain. I nearly drop my phone.
This isn’t a recovery report. It’s an authorization. This was someone, somewhere, deciding—in writing—that certain lives were expendable if the objective justified it.
My thoughts instantly go to Chance. Of small therapy rooms with brightly colored mats.
Of waiting chairs bolted to linoleum floors.
Of emergency contact forms with my name written carefully in black ink.
Of how small and fragile he felt when he slept, one hand fisted in my shirt like the world might disappear if he let go.
I thought of how tiny people looked on paper when someone powerful reduced them to numbers.
Acceptable outcomes. Never. People aren’t problems to be handled or erased just because someone powerful decided it was easier that way.
I quickly slide the document back into the envelope just as a voice cuts through the mailroom.
“Excuse me,” the feminine voice says before clearing her throat.
I nearly jump out of my skin, my heart slamming violently against my ribs as I turn around, instinctively pressing the flap closed with my thumb.
A tall, polished, blonde woman stands in the doorway. I know who she is. Her name eludes me, but she doesn’t need one. She’s Morgan Creed's new assistant of the month.
“Can I help you?” I ask.
She balances a tablet against her hip, posture immaculate, heels clicking softly against the concrete floor as she steps closer to me. Her eyes move from my face to the envelope in my hands and back again, sharp and assessing.
“Is that… executive mail?” she asks, her smile tight, professional.
I take a deep breath, forcing my body to relax and my expression to remain neutral. I reach for the tape dispenser with steady fingers and seal the envelope.
“It is. I’m doing a quick routing correction,” I say quietly. “It was misfiled.”
The secretary hums softly, clearly unconvinced.
“Right,” she says, drawing out the word longer than she should. “Well. Good catch. Who’s it for?”
“Mr. Creed.” I step over to my computer and quickly log the reroute exactly as I’ve been trained. Time stamp. Error code. Verification initials. I triple-check the entry before submitting.
“Well then, it’s lucky that I showed up. I’ll take that for you.” She holds out her hand and I hesitate for a moment, before giving it to her. She turns on her heels and quickly leaves the mailroom, the clacking of her heels on the floor echoing even after she’s disappeared from sight.
“Crap,” I exhale. I needed to hand-deliver it to him. But maybe this is a saving grace. She is his assistant, so it should be okay. I go back to my terminal and add an amendment to my entry stating that the envelope was delivered to his assistant in the mailroom.
I push the encounter to the back of my mind and get back to work. I still have a lot to do before I leave.
Thirty minutes later it hits me she never said what she was here for.