Reid
It should have felt normal. But nothing felt normal now.
He nodded to his colleagues.
They pointedly ignored him.
Cowards.
He had done exactly what the job required.
There was a tightness under his ribs that had not eased since the moment the cuffs closed around Maya’s wrists. Reid ignored it.
If the rest of the office lacked the integrity to stomach it, that wasn’t his problem.
Reid rinsed his hands, watching the suds slip away. The door opened behind him and Reid watched in the mirror as Brian came in.
He ignored Reid and turned toward the urinals.
“I didn’t let myself be led by my emotions,” Reid said, raising his voice, but keeping his gaze on his hands. “I arrested a criminal. That’s my job.”
The word criminal sent a wave of wrongness through him. It felt like his gut telling him there was something he had missed. But that wasn’t true, was it?
Reid kept his hands under the water and made himself say it again in his head.
Criminal.
Brian didn’t respond at first. There was the sound of a flush, the soft rustle of movement, then the tap turning on at the sink beside him.
Reid met his eyes in the mirror.
Brian washed his hands, rubbing his palms together.
Brian shook his head. “You’ve never made a personal arrest before now. Not once.”
Reid felt something in his chest pull taut. Brian watched him for a moment longer, something unreadable in his expression. He reached for a paper towel, drying his hands.
“I’ve never seen you act more emotional in my life.”
Emotional? Reid had never been more rational.
He had nothing to be ashamed about. He wasn’t the one who had betrayed his marriage vows. That was his wife. His lying, thieving, criminal wife.
His jaw ached from clenching. Why did it feel so wrong? Why was something itching at him? Was it just regret?
Brian tossed the towel into the bin and headed for the door, pausing only long enough to glance back.
“I don’t know how you are okay with this,” he said. The door swung shut behind him, the sound echoing faintly in the tiled room.
Reid lifted his gaze to the mirror. His colleagues were all wrong. He was in the right, here. He was being punished for doing his job correctly.
If protecting the law made him cold, then fine. At least he could still look at himself in the mirror.
“…an exemplary demonstration,” Director Sullivan’s voice carried across the conference room. “Agent Lawson went above and beyond.”
Reid stood beside the long conference table with his hands loosely clasped behind his back. He kept his expression neutral.
“Our department is seen as a beacon of integrity,” she continued. “Agent Lawson’s actions need to be rewarded.”
Sullivan stepped forward and handed him the printed commendation.
Reid inclined his head slightly. “Thank you, ma’am.”
There was a belated spattering of applause. Almost immediately, chairs were pushed back and his colleagues stood and headed back toward their desks. The brief ceremony dissolved into ordinary office noise within seconds.
Reid walked back to the cluster of desks his team occupied near the windows.
None of his team made eye contact with him. None of them congratulated him.
Most people talked about integrity. Reid had proven he actually possessed it. If his colleagues couldn't see that was their failing, not his.
Three monitors glowed in front of him, each displaying a different set of financial records.
But he couldn’t concentrate.
There was a sense, faint and persistent, that he was missing something obvious. But that couldn’t be true.
The commendation drew his eye. He reached forward and turned it face-down.
He didn’t need to look at it. He knew what it said.
Work was what mattered.
Reid tabbed through another set of entries.
“…his own wife…”
His fingers paused for a fraction of a second over the keyboard.
He kept his gaze fixed on the screen, as the conversation drifted from somewhere behind him.
“…couldn’t have waited…?”
“…in public, like that…”
Reid clicked to the next sheet, cross-referencing the entries.
The law should be the most important thing to everyone in this office. They were the ones who had a problem.
Not him.
His attention kept moving from his screen to the face-down commendation.
Reid clenched his jaw and pulled his focus back to the data. It took more effort than it should have.
Next time his attention drifted he yanked the drawer to his desk open, swept the paper in and slammed it closed.
His hands returned to the keyboard. He had followed the evidence. He had acted on it.
A restless, crawling unease moved at the back of his mind.