And 48 people had laughed. Not one of them had reported it. Not one of them had reached out to ask if she was okay. This wasn't three bad men blowing off steam. This was a whole room full of people who thought what happened to her was funny.
"Who posted it? " Alice asked, her voice flat and hard. "Gordon," Dove said. But it's not just him anymore. Everybody's got it now. Everybody's talking about it.
Alice looked down the hallway at the officers still glancing her way, still whispering behind their hands. She understood something in that moment that she hadn't understood the night before, standing alone in the breakroom. This wasn't going to be solved quietly. If she reported it and let the department handle it behind closed doors, nothing would change. The culture that let this happen was too big, too comfortable, too normal to everyone inside it.
She needed this on record officially with her name on it loud and clear so nobody could pretend later that it never happened. "Thank you for telling me," Alice said to Dove. "I mean that. " Dove nodded, looking almost ashamed. What are you going to do? "I'm going to internal affairs," Alice said.
"Right now, before my shift even starts. " Dove's eyes widened slightly. Vincent. Some of the guys aren't going to like that. "I don't care what they like," Alice said. She turned and walked out of the locker room, back straight, chin up, ignoring every pair of eyes that followed her down the hall.
She could feel people watching her go, whispering behind her back, probably already guessing where she was headed. Let them guess. Let them talk. Alice pushed through the double doors at the end of the hallway toward the small office marked internal affairs. Her hand was steady on the handle.
Whatever happened next, she wasn't going to be the only one who remembered what those three men did to her in that breakroom. She opened the door and stepped inside. The internal affairs office was small and quiet, just a desk, two chairs, and a man named Lieutenant Logan Fenwick sitting behind a computer, glasses pushed up on his forehead. He looked up when Alice walked in, and something in his face told her he already knew why she was there. Maybe he'd seen the video, too.
Maybe everyone had. Officer Vincent," he said. "Sit down. Tell me what happened. " Alice sat. She kept her voice steady as she told him everything.
Corbin with the scissors. Miller holding her arms so she couldn't move. Gordon filming the whole thing like it was entertainment. She told him about the group chat, about the 48 views, about the caption calling it a welcome to the family. Fenwick listened without interrupting.