Chapter 3 - The Purge
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My first telephone call at eight o’clock was to a commercial locksmith I had used for warehouse properties in the past.
Hank was a retired marine with thick gray hair and an appreciation for direct instructions.
“Hank, I have a residential property north of downtown that needs every exterior lock rekeyed by noon,” I said calmly.
“Standard deadbolts or heavy-duty brass?” Hank asked without asking a single personal question.
“Heavy-duty deadbolts, new electronic keypad on the front door, and a digital deadlock for the back patio,” I instructed.
“I will be there in forty-five minutes, Miss Sutton,” he answered.
My second call went to a local two-man moving service whose dispatcher I knew through my distribution network.
I requested a cargo van and two strong workers for four hours of heavy lifting starting at ten in the morning.
Once the logistics were locked in, I pulled six rolls of industrial brown packing tape and twenty flattened corrugated boxes from my basement storage closet.
Nathan had arrived at my duplex sixteen months ago with four suitcases, two plastic storage bins, and a mountain of unpaid credit card debt.
He had slowly spread his footprint across my home until his belongings occupied half the space.
I started in the primary bedroom.
I pulled his suits, his running shoes, his leather boots, and his designer sneakers out of the walk-in closet.
Every hanger was stripped bare within fifteen minutes.
I folded nothing.
I packed his clothes into the boxes with clinical efficiency, sealing each carton with two layers of heavy packing tape.
I cleared the master bathroom next.
His beard trimmer, expensive hair clays, teeth-whitening kits, and luxury shaving balms went straight into box number four.
I pulled his golf clubs out of the hall closet.
I dismantled his high-end gaming console from the media center, winding the power cords neatly with zip ties.
I boxed his vinyl collection, his kettlebells, and the espresso machine that he had never bothered to clean properly.
By nine-thirty, seven identical boxes were lined up along the hallway like shipping crates awaiting freight pickup.
Hank arrived at nine-forty in a white service van.
He replaced the brass cylinder on the front door, drilled a reinforced strike plate into the jamb, and installed a heavy-duty smart lock.
“Here are your master keys,” Hank said, handing me a brass ring.
“Only the numeric code programmed into the digital pad will open this door from the outside starting today,” he added.
“Set the administrative PIN to something only you know, Miss Sutton.”
I immediately set the access code to the date Nathan’s dental clinic hired Evelyn Harper.
It felt fitting that the date of his betrayal would be the very number that kept him on the sidewalk.
The movers arrived promptly at ten o'clock with hand trucks and furniture pads.
The two young men looked at the mountain of sealed boxes stacked in the foyer with mild surprise.
“Where is this load going, ma'am?” the driver asked, holding a digital tablet.
“To a climate-controlled self-storage facility out on 28th Street,” I replied with an encouraging smile.
“Every box labeled with a black marker goes into the truck.”
“What about the furniture?” he asked, pointing toward the couch.
“None of the furniture belongs to him,” I said firmly.
“Only the sealed boxes, the golf bag, the weights, and the electronic equipment.”
It took forty-five minutes for the crew to clear the hallway.
When the moving van backed out of my driveway, my duplex felt twenty square feet larger.
The air inside the house suddenly felt lighter, as though a heavy cloud of deceit had been vacuumed out of the rooms.
I grabbed a sponge, a bucket of warm soapy water, and a bottle of citrus cleaner.
May you like
I scrubbed every drawer, every shelf, and every baseboard where his possessions had rested.
When I finished, not a single stray hair, loose collar stay, or stray sock remained inside my walls.
