Chapter 8 - No Place to Hide|
The first man came into Second Page carrying no book.
Naomi noticed because everyone else that morning had brought something carefully wrapped.
He looked at the counter, the workbench, and the staircase behind it.
Then he placed an envelope beside the register.
“For your niece.”
June did not touch it.
“You can give it to her attorney.”
The man smiled as though she had made a pleasant joke.
“Old buildings are expensive to insure.”
He left before Naomi reached the front of the shop.
Inside the envelope was a photograph of June unlocking the door that morning.
There was no message.
There did not need to be one.
Naomi called Mara, who told them to preserve the envelope and contact the police.
June locked the shop while they waited.
Her hands were steady until she tried to pour water into a glass.
Then she missed the rim.
Naomi took the pitcher without commenting.
The officer who arrived photographed the envelope, took statements, and asked about cameras on neighboring buildings.
His practical questions helped more than reassurance would have.
The hardware store had a camera facing the sidewalk.
The owner offered the recording without asking why the two women needed it.
That afternoon, Mara spoke with the investigators already reviewing the financial material and reported the new threat.
They discussed safer temporary arrangements and how to document any further contact.
None of it made the world instantly safe.
It gave Naomi something to do besides imagine footsteps on the stairs.
“I should leave,” she told June after the officer went.
Her aunt sat at the kitchen table with both hands around a mug.
“We probably both should for a few nights.”
“I mean leave you.”
June looked up.
“That man chose to walk into my shop.”
“Because of me.”
“Because somebody sent him.”
Naomi turned toward the window.
She knew how fear made people accept responsibility for things other people had done.
Knowing did not prevent the feeling.
They packed overnight bags while Mara arranged a place whose address would not be shared with the families.
June insisted on collecting the customers' irreplaceable books first and placing them in the shop's secure storage cabinet.
Naomi wrapped the cookbook in clean paper.
Its owner had tucked a note inside describing her mother's handwriting in the margins.
That small faith in ordinary things nearly undid her.
At the temporary apartment, she called Mara again.
“If I give a formal statement, can I take it back later?”
“You can correct something you've said.”
Mara paused.
“You should assume you cannot make the underlying facts disappear.”
Naomi sat on the edge of a bed that belonged to neither the family she had left nor the woman sheltering her.
For the first time, she understood the attraction of surrender.
One phone call might buy quiet.
Her father would call it reconciliation.
Duly might call it coming home.
The photograph of June remained inside an evidence envelope, refusing those gentler names.
“Arrange the statement,” Naomi said.
She spent the following day explaining what she knew and what she did not.
She identified the forged signature, described the pressure to approve the sale, and supplied the documents she had received lawfully.
When she did not remember a date, she said so.
When she was frightened, she asked for a break.
The investigators did not ask her to be fearless.
They asked her to be accurate.
Late that evening, Duly received a copy of the threat report through his attorney.
He called Lyall into the office and showed him the photograph.
Lyall recognized the man caught on the hardware store's camera.
He had once worked Moretti security jobs.
“Who hired him?” Duly asked.
“I'll find out.”
“Do that without making him disappear.”
Lyall studied him.
Duly looked at the photograph again.
May you like
He had wanted Naomi found.
Now someone was using the habits of his own organization to make her afraid of being seen.
