Page 47 of Punishing Penelope
Walking through everything he did to me tonight, I can’t find it in me to be upset. When I’ve recovered, I hope I get to try that again… with this man. I don’t want anyone else to touch me ever again. Maybe ask him to go easier on me with the magic wand, though, because that shit is wicked.
Peter reaches over and pulls down the visor in front of me. “Don’t want you caught on camera. Put this on.” He hands me a black no-brand cap. “Stuff your hair into it.”
“Paranoid much?” I wrap my hair in my fist and push the cap down over it, then flip the lid of the visor mirror and take a look. A few stray hairs hang loose, but it should be all right.
He pulls the front down to cover me better. “Careful.”
“You’re not supposed to do this?”
“Very much not.”
“You bad boy.”
He gives me a sideways glance that tells me exactly how bad he plans to be. With me. Again.
“Oh, yes.”
Chapter Eleven
Peter
She sits in silence in my uncomfortable office chair, watching through her choice of my body-cam recordings from the last couple of weeks. Fast-forwarding through hours of nothing going on, she’s transfixed by the brutal action-filled sequences. I didn’t pick out anything for her, even though I could’ve because I want her to know I have nothing to hide.
A hiss escapes her when she plummets through the air with me in yesterday’s two-story leap. I still feel it in my knees as a dull ache. I hope I didn’t tear a meniscus.
The last struggle looks brutal up close. The film is shaky. His fear and my rage caught on the recording make my adrenaline rise again.
Finally, she looks up, with the film stopped on the last frame on the computer screen, and
I wait for her response.
“I didn’t know,” she says softly. “I thought I knew, but…”
“This is everyone’s story.” I point at the desks around me. ““This is everyone’s story. This is our work. Yes, there are bad apples, but you have them in journalism, too. Every profession has them, but most cops, most attorneys, most judges are honest, hardworking people.”
“Your bad apples have huge consequences, though, Peter. It doesn't compare. What do you want from me? I’m not gonna stop chasing the truth. I just ain’t.”
“Then chase the truths. Don’t do your broad swipes and jab at everyone. Dig deeper. Isn’t that what you’re good at? And, by the way, I disagree. The written word can kill, too.”
“It’s not that easy. Y’all cover for each other. No one talks.”
“I’m surprised a hotshot reporter like you doesn’t already have a man or a woman on the inside.”
“Like I said…”
“We all cover for each other.”
“Yeah.”
“Seen enough?”
“I had no idea it was this bad. You’re… you could die. Every time you’re called out there, you could die.”
“Do you understand why we’re tight? Everyone wants to get home to the wife and kids, Pen.” I look around me. It was against the rules to bring her here and show her all this, but I needed her to see it, and I trust her to not rat me out. “Let’s go. We’re done here.”
She stands and glances at the dark, deeper recesses of the room and down the corridor.
“I want to show you something, too. Please. I need to show you the bad. You need to see it. You have to be a really bad boy one more time.”