I paused in the doorway. When Lucy had told me to run a few bolts of red satin to Womenswear, I had expected to run across blouses and maybe some satin pajamas. I had not expected to find Mrs. Claus pinning white lace onto an elf’s red bra while the elf stood in her underwear and said things like, “Yeah, it itches if you put it there” and “That’s what I was saying about the cups gaping.”

After a few minutes, the elf noticed me and cleared her throat. Mary looked up.

“Is that the charmeuse?” she asked.

I held up the bolts, but they weren’t labeled. “I think so?” I said. “Lucy said to bring you the satin.”

“That’s it,” she said. She nodded to a table. “Set it there.”

I did, while she stood back and stared intently at the bra. I cleared my throat. Mary looked at me.

“You make lingerie?” I said. “I thought this was all for, like… kids.”

“This is the Santa Baby line,” she said. “Not for kids. We sell it to department stores. Helps us cover costs whenever we need to buy things from the Humdrum world.”

“Lingerie, though?” I said.

For some reason, the idea wouldn’t settle in my mind. This was the North Pole. We were at Santa Claus’s Workshop. Sexy bras didn’t enter into it.

“Oh, come on, where do you think all those faux fur-trimmed teddies came from around the holidays?” Mary said. “I made one for myself a few years back with the cutest little G-string and Santa went just crazy over it, so we decided to go commercial.”

She winked.

I cringed.

The last thing on the entire planet I wanted to hear about was Santa and Mrs. Claus’s love life.

“I’d better get back to Children’s,” I said. Mary nodded seriously, but her eyes twinkled, and the half-naked elf behind her barely suppressed a smile.

I darted back into the hall as quickly as possible and almost ran into Noelle, who was holding a clipboard. She held a hand up between us to stop me.

“Sorry,” I said, just as she said, “I’ve been looking for you.”

I wasn’t in the mood for another transfer, and definitely not one to Womenswear, if that’s what she was about to say. She pursed her lips and waved me to follow her.

We went into Mary’s office, and Noelle closed the door.

“I understand you’ve been asking about Jack Frost,” she said. She held her clipboard up against her chest like it was a shield. She stared at me, waiting for an answer.

“Is that a crime?” I said. I folded my arms.

“It’s not a crime,” she said, frowning. “Just because something’s legal doesn’t mean it’s wise.”

Not only had I recently been run over by a sleigh, but I’d just learned that Santa Claus had a preference for sexy teddies. That was enough stress for one month. I was not in the mood for a lecture on top of it.

“Did Joy tell you?” I said.

“Someone overheard you,” she said.

“I didn’t know who he was. I asked. Now I know.” I held up my hands. “I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to talk about him.”

Noelle gave me an intense look, like she was trying to figure out if I was a fundamentally truthful person. I had no idea how I was supposed to convey that with my mere presence, so I kept my arms folded and let her stare.

I was liking her less and less by the second.

“You should stay out of it,” she said.

“I’m not in it,” I said. Everything about her got my hackles up, from her pursed lips to her Peter Pan collar to the judgmental look I got every time I encountered her. “I didn’t realize asking a basic question meant I was getting involved in something. That’s not how things work where I’m from.”

“This isn’t where you’re from,” Noelle said. “The consequences of any breach in the North Pole’s security would be severe.”

“So I hear.”

She tapped her fingers on the back of the clipboard and continued to stare at me. Finally, she said, “Just stay out of it, okay? You know who he is now, so there’s no reason to keep talking to the elves about it. We don’t need people panicking more than they are already.”

“No one I talked to was panicking,” I said.

“Let’s keep it that way.”

She looked like she’d rather keep me in the room with her, where I would be under control and not asking meddlesome questions, but there was no reason for me to stay. I raised my eyebrows and waited, and she sighed and stepped away from the door.

“Thanks,” I said dryly, and left.