Chapter 6 - THE MAN WHO WANTED HER FATHER'S WATCH
"Then we don't let him take it," Jolene said.
Dominic looked up from the redevelopment application.
"Moreau controls the debt. This isn't something we can stop by refusing to leave."
"I didn't say refusing was the whole plan."
She pulled a chair beside him.
"We have forty-eight vendors, hundreds of regular customers, and a market association that's been operating for decades. We can organize."
"Moreau has lawyers, money, and people willing to commit arson."
"And you have money, lawyers, and a frightening reputation."
Marco cleared his throat.
"She's making a reasonable argument."
Dominic gave him a look.
Marco smiled.
Jolene leaned closer.
"Your father used people's fear of losing this market to keep them quiet. Don't make the same mistake by deciding what happens to us without asking."
Dominic set down the papers.
"What do you want?"
"A vendor-owned cooperative. A real lease. No more depending on whichever powerful man owns the building."
He considered that.
"Even if I recover the property?"
"Especially then."
For several seconds, he studied her.
Then he nodded.
"All right. We'll find a way."
It was the first time Jolene realized she could imagine building something with Dominic Valcourt.
Not because he could give her what she wanted.
Because he was willing to listen when she told him what she needed.
The next morning, Riverstone held an emergency association meeting.
Lupe brought coffee.
Dani brought a notebook.
Mr. Abernathy brought a folding chair that squeaked every time he moved.
By the end of two hours, the vendors had formed a committee to negotiate a long-term lease and establish a cooperative.
Jolene was elected chairwoman.
She objected.
Everyone ignored her.
"You've been telling us what to do for twenty minutes," Lupe said. "Congratulations. It's official."
The room laughed.
Jolene smiled.
For the first time since discovering the green door, she felt that something might actually improve.
Then Stefan Moreau arrived.
He wore a charcoal suit and a gray scarf despite the warm weather.
His dark hair was brushed neatly back.
He looked like a successful businessman attending a charity luncheon.
Two younger men followed him.
Moreau stopped beside Jolene's jewelry display.
"Miss Hartley."
She turned.
"Do I know you?"
"Not personally."
He picked up a bracelet.
"Very delicate work."
"Thank you."
"Your father taught you?"
Jolene's smile disappeared.
"Who are you?"
"Stefan Moreau."
Behind her, Lupe stopped stacking chairs.
Jolene set down her tools.
"Then you're the man trying to close our market."
Moreau looked almost disappointed.
"That's an unfortunate interpretation of a commercial disagreement."
"You bought the debt and filed a demolition proposal."
"I invest in distressed properties."
"Then find one without forty-eight families depending on it."
A faint smile crossed his face.
"You sound like Henry."
Jolene went still.
"You knew my father?"
"Many years ago."
"How?"
"We had mutual business acquaintances."
He glanced toward the green door.
Jolene noticed.
Everyone seemed to look at that door.
It had become the center of everything.
Moreau placed the bracelet back on its velvet tray.
"I understand you've inherited your father's pocket watch."
Jolene's stomach tightened.
"That's a strange thing for a property investor to know."
"Your father was a remarkable craftsman. I'm something of a collector."
"It's not for sale."
"Everything has a price."
"Not everything."
He watched her for a moment.
Then his pleasant expression became colder.
"Dominic Valcourt will eventually tire of this disagreement. I wouldn't advise making your future depend on his generosity."
"My future doesn't belong to him."
"Good."
Moreau adjusted his scarf.
"Then perhaps you should stop believing he'll save you."
He walked away.
Jolene stood motionless until he disappeared into the courtyard.
Something about his interest in the watch frightened her.
Not because the watch was valuable.
Because it wasn't.
It was scratched, broken, and worth perhaps a hundred dollars.
Unless Moreau wanted it for another reason.
That afternoon, Dominic took Jolene to visit Luis at the rehabilitation clinic.
The young man from the service corridor had survived surgery.
His arm remained in a brace, but he was recovering.
He recognized Jolene immediately.
"You're the lady who helped me."
"I'm glad you're doing better."
Luis looked toward Dominic.
His face tightened.
Dominic remained near the doorway.
"I'm not here to threaten you."
"That's what the other guy said."
Jolene pulled up a chair.
"Tell me what happened."
Luis stared at his injured arm.
"I was hired to move freight paperwork through the warehouse. Envelopes. Sealed folders. Stuff I wasn't supposed to open."
"Who hired you?"
"A man working for Moreau."
"Why the green door?"
"Because it opened behind the market. Nobody paid attention to it."
Jolene thought of the years she'd spent sitting only a few feet away.
"What happened that night?"
"They installed a new lock. I found out the emergency release had been removed."
"Did you ask why?"
Luis nodded.
"They said the old release made it too easy for outsiders to get in. I told them it wasn't safe."
He looked down.
"Then I heard them talking about another shipment. Somebody was sending Mr. Valcourt's routes to Moreau."
Dominic stepped forward.
"Who?"
Luis shook his head.
"I didn't see him. But one of them called him Simon."
The room went silent.
Luis continued.
"I tried to put the release back. A guy caught me. He shoved me against the freight mechanism."
He looked at Jolene.
"That's how I got cut."
"Why didn't you tell the police?"
"They said they'd blame me for stealing the freight records. I needed the money. My mom's sick."
Jolene reached across the table.
"Needing money doesn't mean you deserved what happened."
Luis looked close to tears.
Dominic took a card from his jacket.
"This is an independent attorney. I'll pay for the consultation, but he won't work for me. Tell him everything. Including anything my employees did."
Luis stared at the card.
"You'd do that?"
"Yes."
Jolene watched Dominic carefully.
He hadn't promised to make the problem disappear.
He'd offered Luis a way to tell the truth.
It mattered.
That evening, Caleb examined Henry's pocket watch under his desk lamp.
Jolene sat beside him.
"Anything?"
"The movement's damaged, but the case is fine."
He turned it over.
"Dad scratched something inside the back cover."
Jolene leaned closer.
Three tiny letters and a number were visible.
W-14.
Beneath them were two initials.
P.K.
M.D.
Jolene recognized the names immediately.
Paul Kessler.
Martin Delgado.
"Eleven fourteen," she whispered.
Caleb frowned.
"What?"
"The time the gate was locked."
She looked at the broken hands.
Their father had preserved the exact moment two men lost their lives.
But why carve their initials inside the watch?
"Maybe Dad wanted to remember them," Caleb said.
Jolene swallowed.
"Maybe."
Then she remembered something.
Rosa had mentioned a third man on the loading dock.
A survivor.
Someone nobody had identified.
If that man had been rescued before the gate closed, he might have seen everything.
"Caleb, can you help me find an old emergency report?"
"Probably. The city archives digitized a lot of public records."
They searched through the evening.
The flood records were incomplete.
Several pages were missing from the original incident summary.
But an archived newspaper article listed the hospital patients treated that night.
One name stood out.
Stefan M. Moreau.
Age twenty-eight.
Treated for a broken wrist, smoke inhalation, and exposure after escaping the Riverstone loading dock.
Jolene stared at the screen.
"That's him."
Caleb leaned closer.
"The property investor?"
She nodded.
He hadn't merely known her father.
He'd been there.
He was the third man.
The one Paul Kessler and Martin Delgado had gone back to help.
And he'd survived while they died.
Jolene carried the information to Dominic's office the next morning.
He read the article in silence.
Then he turned to Marco.
"Why didn't our original investigation identify him?"
Marco looked troubled.
"His name was removed from the internal incident summary. We relied on your father's records."
Dominic pushed the paper away.
"He witnessed the flood."
Jolene nodded.
"He knows what happened. He knows why the gate was locked."
"And he's been buying access to my freight routes to force me into a financial fight."
"Why now?"
Dominic looked toward the photograph of his father on the office wall.
"Because he found someone inside my organization willing to help him."
Jolene thought of Simon.
The man who had locked his own father inside the warehouse.
"He's blackmailing Simon."
"Possibly."
"Then Simon may be as frightened as we are."
Dominic regarded her.
"Fear doesn't excuse what he's done."
"No. But understanding it might help us stop him."
Dominic looked back at the article.
Something had been bothering him.
"Stefan told everyone he escaped through the upper loading entrance."
"That's what Rosa said."
"Then he should've had a broken leg or injuries from the stairs. The upper platform was almost twenty feet above the flooded loading dock."
Jolene examined the article again.
A broken wrist.
Smoke inhalation.
No major fall injuries.
Dominic opened a copy of Henry's original warehouse diagram.
His finger moved to a narrow maintenance passage behind the freight bay.
"There's another exit."
"Where?"
Dominic pointed to the green door.
"The passage behind your stall."
Jolene felt cold.
The same entrance someone had changed six weeks ago.
The same corridor Moreau wanted to control.
Dominic looked at her.
"Stefan Moreau didn't escape through the upper loading entrance."
"Then what happened?"
"He used Henry's emergency release."
Jolene stared at the brass key lying beside the diagram.
The terrible possibility settled between them.
Paul and Martin hadn't simply gone back to help a stranger.
May you like
They had stayed behind while Stefan Moreau escaped through the only working emergency exit.
And now the man they had helped save was trying to destroy everything their families had left.
