Chapter 5 - The Man Who Used My Hand
Aaron put his badge and sidearm on my desk before I asked.
"I did not disable that camera."
I believed him.
That was the problem.
Belief had become dangerous.
"Your biometric login did."
"I know."
"Mine did not."
"I know."
Tessa stood near the fireplace with both boys behind her.
She had refused to let them return to the gatehouse.
I did not blame her.
Every unlocked door now felt like an accusation.
Aaron took a slow breath.
"Biometric systems can be spoofed."
"Not easily."
"No."
"Who has access to your prints?"
He looked at me.
"Anyone who has touched something I touched."
That answer did not help.
I turned toward Dana Pierce, who had arrived twenty minutes earlier.
She was reading Katherine Cole's notebook under a desk lamp with gloved hands.
"Anything?"
"Enough to know she was documenting money movement."
"What kind?"
"Payroll deductions that do not match payroll records."
"Explain."
Dana pointed to a series of entries.
"These employee numbers correspond to contracted night workers at South Halsted."
"You checked already?"
"I had Legal pull archived rosters."
"What are the dollar amounts?"
"That is the interesting part."
She tapped one column.
"Every amount is small."
"Twenty-two dollars."
"Thirty-seven."
"Forty-one."
"Fifty-six."
Tessa frowned.
"So?"
"So small theft is easier to hide than large theft," Dana said.
I understood immediately.
"If you take forty dollars from five thousand workers every pay period, no single person looks worth a lawsuit."
Dana nodded.
"But the total becomes enormous."
Tessa's face hardened.
"My mother used to complain her checks were always short."
"What did they tell her?"
"That taxes changed."
"Did she believe them?"
"No."
"Clearly."
Dana turned another page.
"There are vendor codes here too."
I leaned closer.
One code appeared repeatedly.
HBR-771.
I recognized it.
"Harrow Bridge Resources."
Dana looked up.
"You know it?"
"Temporary labor contractor."
"Former contractor."
"When did we terminate them?"
"About eleven months ago."
"Why?"
"Performance issues."
I looked at her.
"Who recommended them originally?"
Dana's mouth tightened.
"Victor."
Tessa laughed bitterly.
"Of course."
I ignored the comment.
"Who owned Harrow Bridge?"
"Officially, a man named Calvin Royce."
"Unofficially?"
"I am still digging."
"What about the settlement payment?"
Dana closed the notebook.
"I traced the law firm trust account."
"And?"
"The firm transferred the money two days later to Harrow Bridge Resources."
The room went silent.
Tessa looked at me.
"So the money supposedly paid to my father went to the contractor stealing workers' wages."
"That is what it looks like."
"Say it plainly."
Dana did.
"Yes."
Tessa's hands curled into fists.
I picked up Katherine's notebook.
"Why would her mother know the settlement authorization time before the settlement happened?" Aaron asked.
Everyone looked at him.
I checked the dates again.
Katherine died on November 25.
The settlement was dated November 18.
Her funeral had not happened yet because she was still alive when the document was executed.
I felt my stomach drop.
"Victor told me Owen contacted us two weeks after the funeral."
Dana's eyes narrowed.
"That is impossible."
Tessa stepped toward the desk.
"What are you saying?"
I held up the settlement.
"This agreement was signed one week before your mother died."
She stared at the date.
"No."
"It is right here."
"No."
Her voice broke.
"My father could not have settled a wrongful death claim before she was dead."
"No."
"So what was this?"
I looked at Dana.
She looked back at me.
Neither of us liked the answer.
"This document may have been created to explain a payment," she said carefully.
"What payment?" Tessa demanded.
"To Harrow Bridge."
"For what?"
"We do not know."
Tessa slammed her palm on the desk.
"Stop saying that."
Noah flinched.
Tessa saw it and immediately stepped back.
"I am sorry."
She crouched beside him.
"I am not mad at you."
He nodded.
Eli did not move.
His eyes were fixed on the notebook.
"Mom wrote about a bridge."
Tessa turned.
"What?"
"The red bridge."
"There is no red bridge."
"No."
He shook his head impatiently.
"In her phone."
"What are you talking about?"
"She had a note in her phone called Red Bridge."
Tessa stared at him.
"You used her phone?"
"Sometimes."
"Why did you never tell me?"
"You never asked."
That answer was painfully twelve years old.
"Do you still have the phone?" I asked.
Tessa looked at me.
"It stopped working after the funeral."
"Where is it?"
"In a box at our apartment."
I turned to Aaron.
"Send two people."
Tessa stood.
"I am going with them."
"No."
Her head snapped toward me.
I corrected myself before she could.
"I mean I do not think it is safe."
"My mother's things are in that apartment."
"I understand."
"No, you do not."
She grabbed her coat.
"I am going."
I grabbed mine.
"Then I am going too."
"Why?"
"Because apparently this is what my evenings look like now."
For the first time, Eli almost smiled.
We drove to Tessa's neighborhood just before midnight.
The building sat on a narrow street lined with old brick apartments, laundromats, and convenience stores with metal gates over the windows.
The hallway smelled like radiator heat and bleach.
Tessa unlocked the third-floor apartment.
The door opened three inches and stopped.
Something blocked it.
Aaron's guard pushed carefully.
A broken chair had been wedged beneath the handle from inside.
That made no sense.
The apartment was supposed to be empty.
Security entered first.
Then I heard one of them swear.
Every drawer had been pulled out.
Mattresses were overturned.
Cabinet doors hung open.
Clothes covered the floor.
The place had been searched.
Not robbed.
Searched.
Tessa moved past me.
"No."
She ran to the small bedroom she shared with Noah's belongings.
A cardboard box sat open on the floor.
Photographs had been scattered around it.
She dropped to her knees and started looking through them.
"Where is it?"
"What?"
"Mom's phone."
It was gone.
Tessa searched the cardboard box again as if the phone might appear if she punished the same pile of photographs hard enough.
She found her mother's old work badge instead.
The plastic was cracked across Katherine's photograph.
Tessa rubbed her thumb over the name.
"She hated this picture."
"Why?"
"She said the photographer told her not to smile because cleaners were supposed to look professional."
I looked at the badge.
Katherine was not smiling.
She looked directly into the camera with an expression that seemed almost impatient.
A knock sounded behind us.
Aaron's guard brought in an elderly woman from across the hall.
She introduced herself as Mrs. Patel.
"I saw your door open earlier," she told Tessa.
"When?"
"Maybe six."
"We were not here."
"I know."
Mrs. Patel looked at me, clearly recognizing my face from television but deciding she had more important things to discuss.
"There was a man."
"What man?"
"Gray coat."
"Middle-aged."
"Very polite."
"Did you see his face?"
"Yes."
Aaron pulled up photographs on his phone.
Graham.
Victor.
Luca.
Calvin Royce.
Mrs. Patel stopped at Graham's picture.
"That one."
Tessa's face hardened.
"Are you sure?"
"He asked me whether you still lived here."
"What did you say?"
"That if he did not know, he should not be opening your door."
Despite everything, Tessa almost smiled.
Mrs. Patel continued.
"He showed me a card."
"What kind?"
"Company identification."
"Rossi?" I asked.
She nodded.
"My name on it?"
"Your company name."
I felt shame rise again.
The logo had become a key that frightened people into stepping aside.
"Did he carry anything out?" Aaron asked.
"A small black bag."
"The phone could have been inside," Tessa said.
Mrs. Patel looked at the room.
"He told me there had been a theft investigation."
Tessa laughed bitterly.
"Of course he did."
I looked at her.
"What?"
"That is how this started."
She pointed toward me.
"You thought I was stealing."
"Now they are using the same word to steal from me."
The symmetry was ugly.
Mrs. Patel looked between us.
"I do not know what this is."
"You do not need to," Tessa said.
"Are you safe?"
Tessa hesitated.
Then she answered honestly.
"I do not know."
Mrs. Patel reached into her sweater pocket and gave Tessa a small key.
"Your mother gave me this after the funeral."
Tessa stared at it.
"What is it?"
"She said if anyone came looking through the apartment, I should give it to you."
"Why did you never tell me?"
"Because nobody came until tonight."
Tessa opened her hand.
The brass key on Mrs. Patel's palm matched the one beneath the floorboard exactly except for the stamped number.
This one read B-16.
We stared at it.
Two lockers.
Whatever Katherine hid at Lakeside had not been limited to B-17.
Eli had stayed at the estate with Noah, but his memory had brought us here for something someone else clearly wanted too.
I looked around the room.
"Who knew you kept her things here?"
"My brothers."
"Anyone else?"
"My father."
She stopped.
Then she reached under the overturned mattress.
Her fingers found a loose floorboard.
"What is that?" I asked.
"My mother used to hide cash here."
She pried the board up.
There was no cash.
There was a small plastic sandwich bag.
Inside it was a brass key.
A paper tag was tied around the ring.
The tag had only three characters written on it.
B-17.
Tessa turned it over.
On the back were two words.
WHERE WE WAITED.
Her face went blank.
"What?" I asked.
She stood slowly.
"I know where this goes."
"Where?"
She looked toward the window.
"When we were little, Mom could not afford after-school care."
"She used to take us with her on days she worked early."
"We would wait for her at the old Lakeside laundromat across from South Halsted."
I remembered Eli's father's message.
Mom hid it where she used to wait when we were little.
Tessa closed her fingers around the key.
"The laundromat had rental lockers in the basement."
I looked at the tag.
"B-17."
She nodded.
Then Aaron's phone rang.
He answered.
His face changed.
"What happened?" I asked.
He listened for several seconds.
Then he lowered the phone.
"Chicago police found Graham Pike's Mercedes."
"Where?"
"Near the river."
"Was he in it?"
"No."
"What was?"
Aaron looked at Tessa, then back at me.
May you like
"A burned Rossi Holdings access card."
"And a photograph of Katherine Cole."
