“Used to be?”
“He lost that right a long time ago.”
Sarah wanted to ask whether rights like that could be lost before or after murder, but Hank lifted his head again.
Footsteps sounded beyond the stairwell door.
He put the photograph away.
“Behind the wall.”
She did not move.
He looked at her, and this time there was no room in his expression for argument.
“Please.”
Sarah stepped behind the concrete partition.
The stairwell door opened.
A man in a navy work jacket came through carrying a cardboard tray with three coffees. He stopped when he saw Hank.
“Elevator’s broken again,” he said.
“Looks like.”
The man continued to a parked sedan, balancing the tray against his chest while he searched for his keys.
Sarah waited until he drove away.
“I can’t do this,” she said.
“You already are.”
“That isn’t helpful.”
“No.”
Hank glanced at her shoes. Thin black sneakers, soaked through at the toes. Then at the bare skin between her sleeves and the cuffs of her apron.
He shrugged out of his rain jacket.
She did not take it.
“Put it on the bike,” she said.
He did.
After a moment, she picked it up.
It was heavy, warm inside, and smelled faintly of motor oil and laundry soap.
“Why now?” she asked.
Hank leaned against a column.
“Your mother got a letter.”
“She didn’t tell me.”
“I’m beginning to understand that’s a family habit.”
Sarah looked at him.
He accepted the look.
“The letter came from a man named Owen Bell. He used to keep books for a freight company near the river. He’s dying. He says he has something Michael left behind.”
“What?”
“We don’t know.”
“Then why would anybody come after me?”
“Because someone else found out about the letter.”
“Who?”
“Cutter.”
Below them, a horn sounded twice.
Hank checked a small phone Sarah had not seen him take out.
“Someone’s coming for us.”
“Another biker?”
“A woman named Ruth.”
“Who is she?”
“The person your mom’s calling.”
Sarah laughed once, without humor.
“Of course she is.”
Hank looked as if he might explain, then stopped.
It was the first sensible thing he had done in several minutes.
Sarah opened Jimmy’s messages.
WHERE ARE YOU?
Those guys asked about you.
Called police. Call me.
She looked up.
“Jimmy called the police.”
“Good.”
The answer surprised her.
“You don’t mind?”
“Sarah, two men followed you into a kitchen. I want that in a report.”
“Then why aren’t we at a station?”
“Because I needed to get you away from them first.”
“We’re away.”
“Yes.”
“So now we go to a station.”
“We can.”
She searched his face for a trap.
He said, “You aren’t my prisoner.”
“You told me to pretend I was your daughter.”
“I needed them to hesitate.”
“Why would that make them hesitate?”
“Because they thought you were alone.”
The simplicity of it struck harder than another threat would have.
Sarah looked at her phone again.
She had six hundred and eighteen dollars in checking. A rent payment due the following week. A community college application half completed on her kitchen table. A cat who would be waiting by the window at four because cats did not know men could enter diners and tear apart the history of a life.
She had not thought of herself as alone.
She had thought of herself as managing.
“I want to call Jimmy,” she said.
“Call him.”
He walked to the edge of the level, giving her what privacy concrete and distance allowed.
Jimmy answered before the first ring finished.
“Tell me you’re okay.”
“I’m okay.”
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know exactly. A garage.”
“Is he there?”
“Yes.”
“Can you talk?”
Sarah watched Hank standing with his back to her.
“Yes.”
“I mean can you really talk?”
“He isn’t holding me here.”
Jimmy exhaled.
“I saw his hand,” he said.
“Whose?”
“The guy behind you. When he came through the kitchen. I saw the gun.”
Sarah closed her eyes.
Until that moment, some stubborn part of her had still been assembling another explanation. Debt collectors. An elaborate mistake. A stranger with a photograph and a story good enough to frighten her mother.
“Did you tell the police?”
“Everything. Officer’s here now. You want to talk to her?”
“Yes.”
There was a muffled exchange.
Then a woman said, “Sarah? This is Officer Nguyen. Are you somewhere safe?”
“I think so.”
“Can you tell me your location?”