He Grabbed the Wrong Woman's Arm in the Lobby — Then the Man Behind Him Stood Up
His fingers close around the woman's sleeve, hard and slow, and the whole lobby goes silent.
Ray Huckabee runs the leasing arm of a downtown tower, and he has just grabbed a plainly dressed older woman at the front gate to teach her a lesson about belonging. What he stands to lose is everything he has built inside that building — and the room is already watching.
He tells her loudly that she has no business in this lobby. She answers that he has likely said that to the wrong person before. He doesn't like that. He closes the distance and takes her arm.
The staff freeze. A receptionist rises from her chair. Somewhere behind the marble, a paper coffee cup loses its grip and drops.
She doesn't pull away. She doesn't step back. She looks at the hand on her sleeve — then lifts her eyes past his shoulder, toward the back of the lobby, past the elevator bank, toward someone who has been standing there the entire time.
Ray is still talking. He never turns around.
A man in a long brown coat has been standing in that shadow since before Ray opened his mouth. He isn't staff. He isn't a visitor. The instant Ray's hand closes on her arm, he takes his first step across the marble — and the employees nearest him stop breathing.
Beside the front doors hangs a gilt name plate. Ray has walked past it a thousand times.
Who is the man in the coat, and what happens when he reaches them? The comments hold the rest — his name, and what became of Ray.
Advertisement