Chapter 3 - THE DEBT THAT DIDN’T EXIST
Nora stared at Declan.
“No.”
“He runs several businesses on the south side.”
“You said he works for you.”
“He does.”
“So you knew.”
“I knew he handled private lending. I did not know he was collecting from you.”
She laughed bitterly.
“That distinction probably sounds enormous from your side of the table.”
Declan accepted the blow without defending himself.
Owen opened Patrick’s folder again.
“Rourke reported every outstanding account quarterly. Nora Bennett doesn’t appear anywhere.”
Declan’s eyes hardened.
“Then he kept her off the books.”
Nora felt sick.
For four years she had skipped meals, worked through fevers, sold Lily’s furniture and slept in laundromats between shifts.
All for a debt that apparently did not officially exist.
“I want to go home.”
Declan stood.
“Nora—”
“Don’t.”
She grabbed the repaired coat from the back of a chair.
Something heavy shifted inside its lining.
Nora frowned.
She reached through the repaired tear.
Her fingers touched metal.
She pulled out an old-fashioned pocket watch.
It wasn’t hers.
Declan crossed the room.
“Where did you get that?”
“I didn’t.”
The silver watch was scratched and tarnished.
The initials P.K. were engraved on the back.
Patrick Keane.
Owen examined the torn lining.
“It must have been sewn inside.”
Nora remembered Lily borrowing the coat constantly during treatment because hospital rooms were always cold.
“My sister wore this.”
Declan opened the watch.
It had stopped at 4:17.
Inside the lid was a tiny photograph.
Lily.
Not sick.
Not frightened.
Laughing.
Nora’s knees weakened.
“He loved her,” she whispered.
Declan looked at Patrick’s face in the hospital photograph again.
“Yes.”
That changed everything.
Patrick had not been assigned to watch Lily.
He had stayed because he cared about her.
Owen found a folded strip of paper behind the watch photograph.
A storage ticket.
Grayhaven Central Station.
Locker 217.
Expired four years earlier.
Declan looked at Nora.
“We go together.”
“No.”
“Rourke may know about it.”
“And you think walking around beside Grayhaven’s most recognizable criminal makes me safer?”
“Yes.”
The simplicity of his answer silenced her.
An hour later, they entered Central Station through a side entrance.
Locker 217 still existed.
Owen had learned that old lockers were never cleared after the station changed contractors.
Inside was a cardboard box.
No cash.
No weapons.
Just Lily’s things.
A knitted cap.
Hospital wristbands.
A paperback novel.
And a child’s drawing.
Nora frowned.
The drawing showed four stick figures.
One was labeled LILY.
One PATRICK.
One NORA.
The fourth was a small girl beneath a yellow sun.
Underneath, in Lily’s handwriting, were the words:
For someday.
Nora touched the page.
“I don’t understand.”
Neither did Declan.
Beneath the drawing was a rosary.
Nora recognized it.
“My mother’s.”
Lily had claimed it disappeared years ago.
Wrapped around the rosary was another note from Patrick.
Rourke knows about Rose.
Nora whispered, “Who is Rose?”
Owen went very still.
Declan noticed.
“You know.”
Owen reluctantly nodded.
“Patrick had a daughter.”
Nora looked at the child in the drawing.
“How old?”
“Six now.”
Her heart lurched.
Lily had died four years ago.
The arithmetic came instantly.
“No.”
Owen said nothing.
Nora looked at Declan.
“No.”
Declan’s voice was quiet.
“Nora.”
“My sister would have told me.”
“Maybe she was trying to.”
The child’s drawing trembled in Nora’s hands.
“Where is she?”
Owen swallowed.
“That’s the problem.”
He turned over Patrick’s old storage record.
Someone had accessed the locker eight months after Patrick’s death.
The signature belonged to Gavin Rourke.
And beside the signature was a handwritten notation.
PROPERTY REMOVED: CHILD’S BIRTH CERTIFICATE.
Nora stared at it.
Declan’s face turned cold.
“Find Rose.”
Owen hesitated.
“Boss, there’s something else.”
He removed a photograph from the bottom of the box.
A recent photograph.
A little girl with brown curls sat on a swing.
Around her wrist was a blue bird bracelet identical to Lily’s.
On the back, someone had written a date.
Three days ago.
Nora stopped breathing.
May you like
Rourke had not merely known the child existed.
He knew exactly where she was.
