Chapter 6 - THE PARKING GARAGE
Lucas called Amanda back before anyone else moved.
The call went straight to voicemail.
He called again.
Then again.
Michael was already pulling on his coat.
"Elena, can you trace the number?"
"Not legally in thirty seconds."
"Then call someone who can."
Elena was typing before he finished.
Willow grabbed Michael's sleeve.
"We don't even know where she is."
Lucas looked at his phone.
"I might."
Everyone turned toward him.
"Amanda kept the same emergency storage unit after our divorce."
"Storage unit?" Helena asked.
"Not for furniture."
Lucas swallowed.
"Documents."
Elena's eyes narrowed.
"Where?"
"Near West Loop."
Michael pointed toward the office phone.
"She called from a mobile."
"The crash could have been anywhere."
Lucas shook his head.
"She said they found her."
"If she was moving evidence, she would go there."
Willow looked at Elena.
"Can we call police?"
"We can and we should."
Elena took out her phone.
"But none of you are turning this into a rescue mission."
Michael looked at her.
Elena held up one finger.
"Especially you."
Ten minutes later, they were in two vehicles.
Elena had contacted Chicago police with the recording of the call and Amanda's phone number.
An officer told them units were checking reported collisions.
Lucas insisted on going to the storage facility.
Willow insisted on going too.
Michael argued.
She did not yield.
"If everyone keeps hiding things to protect me, I will never know what is happening in my own life."
That ended the argument.
Helena stayed at the garage with a police officer and the green ledger.
Michael drove.
Elena sat beside him.
Willow and Lucas sat in the back without touching.
The sky over Chicago was the color of dirty steel.
Every red light felt personal.
Lucas kept staring at his phone.
"She was scared of parking structures."
Willow looked at him.
"Amanda?"
"After we separated."
His voice was distant.
"She said someone followed her into one."
"Did you believe her?"
Lucas did not answer.
Willow understood.
"You thought she was being dramatic."
Lucas looked out the window.
"Yes."
The admission carried no defense this time.
The storage facility stood beneath a converted warehouse on South Morgan Street.
A police cruiser was already outside.
So was an ambulance.
Lucas opened the truck door before Michael had fully stopped.
They ran toward the lower-level entrance.
A uniformed officer blocked them.
"You can't go in."
Lucas held up his phone.
"Amanda Reese."
The officer's expression changed.
"You know her?"
"She's my ex-wife."
"Is she alive?" Willow asked.
The officer looked at all of them.
"Yes."
Lucas nearly collapsed against the concrete wall.
Willow closed her eyes.
"Where is she?"
"Paramedics are checking her."
"What happened?"
"Her vehicle was struck in the garage."
"Accident?"
The officer's face said no before his mouth did.
"Doesn't look like one."
They were allowed through after Elena identified herself as Amanda's counsel on an old matter and the responding detective confirmed Amanda had asked for Michael Donovan.
The lower garage smelled of oil, wet concrete, and burned rubber.
Amanda's gray Volvo sat sideways across two parking spaces.
The rear quarter panel had been crushed inward.
A black SUV had struck it and disappeared.
Amanda sat on the back bumper of an ambulance wrapped in a blanket.
Blood marked her temple.
Her face looked older than the photographs Willow remembered.
Not weaker.
Harder.
Amanda saw Lucas first.
Her expression closed.
Then she saw Willow.
Something softened.
"You're hurt too."
Willow touched her cheek instinctively.
"I'm okay."
Amanda laughed once.
"That sentence should be banned from women in this family."
Lucas stepped closer.
"Amanda."
She looked at him.
"Don't."
He stopped.
"I just wanted to know you're all right."
"You had eight years to wonder."
Lucas absorbed it.
Michael approached.
Amanda's eyes filled.
"I'm sorry about the ledger."
"How did you know where it was?"
"I didn't."
Michael frowned.
"Then why did you say-"
"I knew you still had one."
Amanda looked toward the wrecked Volvo.
"Richard's people found an inventory list in Bell's old files."
Elena stepped forward.
"How do you know that?"
Amanda looked at her.
"Because I have been inside Sterling's archive for three years."
Lucas stared.
"What?"
Amanda smiled without humor.
"Not physically."
"Arthur Bell left me access credentials before he died."
Elena's composure cracked for the first time.
"Why would Bell do that?"
Amanda's expression darkened.
"Because he was afraid Richard would kill the company to save himself."
Michael looked toward the police detective taking photographs.
"Did Bell know about the warehouse fire?"
"He knew enough to be afraid."
Amanda shifted painfully.
The paramedic told her not to move too quickly.
She ignored him.
"The fire twenty-seven years ago was not electrical."
Michael's face tightened.
"You said there was a payment."
Amanda nodded.
"A cash disbursement through a vendor called Lark Industrial."
"There is no Lark Industrial," Michael said.
"Exactly."
Amanda looked at Willow.
"It was a shell."
"The payment was approved by Richard two days before the warehouse burned."
Willow felt sick.
"You're saying he burned my father's records?"
Amanda did not look away.
"I am saying someone was paid through a fake company before the fire, and the payment description says site remediation."
Michael whispered, "That warehouse had every prototype notebook except the one I kept at home."
Amanda nodded.
"Richard thought he had destroyed the chain."
"He didn't know Bell copied the corporate ledger."
Elena crouched beside her.
"Where is the copy?"
Amanda looked toward a blue storage door at the end of the garage.
"Unit 118."
Lucas followed her gaze.
"You kept it here?"
"I kept part of it here."
Amanda reached into her coat pocket.
Her hand came out empty.
Her face changed.
"No."
She checked the other pocket.
Then the blanket.
"What?" Willow asked.
"The key."
Amanda stood too quickly and swayed.
The paramedic caught her arm.
"Ma'am-"
"The key was in my coat."
She looked toward the Volvo.
"Someone opened my door after the crash."
The detective approached.
"Who?"
"I don't know."
"Male? Female?"
"Male."
"I was dazed."
"He asked if I was all right."
Her breathing quickened.
"Then he touched my shoulder."
Michael looked toward Unit 118.
The storage door appeared closed.
Elena turned to the detective.
"Seal that unit."
The detective nodded to another officer.
They walked toward it.
Halfway there, the officer stopped.
"Detective."
The padlock hung from the latch.
Cut cleanly through.
Amanda closed her eyes.
Lucas swore.
The detective pulled the door open.
Inside were metal shelves, file boxes, and one fireproof cabinet.
The cabinet door stood open.
Empty.
Before Amanda reached the open cabinet, the detective asked everyone to stop at the threshold.
A crime-scene technician photographed the floor, the lock, and the edges of the steel door.
Willow stood beside Lucas while the camera flashed.
"Did she keep things like this when you were married?" Willow asked.
Lucas nodded.
"Receipts. Copies. Notes."
"I used to make fun of her for it."
Amanda heard him.
She did not turn around.
"You called it paranoia."
Lucas looked at the floor.
"I know."
Amanda faced him then.
"No. You know now."
"Back then, you knew your father had investigators, private security, lawyers on call, and people who reported to him before they reported to anyone else."
"You knew all of that."
"You just believed it was normal because it protected you."
Lucas swallowed.
Willow felt the sentence settle inside her.
That was the difference between ignorance and privilege.
Lucas had not always known what Richard was doing.
But he had known the machinery existed.
He simply had not imagined it turning toward people he loved.
The technician lifted a clear plastic strip from the floor.
"Shoe impression."
The detective crouched beside it.
A partial tread pattern showed in gray dust.
Amanda looked toward the garage entrance.
"The man who opened my car wore work boots."
"Can you describe them?"
"Black. Heavy sole."
Michael looked at the print.
"Half the contractors in Chicago wear those."
"True," the detective said.
"But half the contractors in Chicago did not just hit your witness's car."
An officer approached carrying a small parking-garage access log.
A service gate had opened seven minutes before Amanda's collision using a temporary contractor credential.
The credential belonged to a vendor registered as Lark Facility Maintenance.
Michael stared at the name.
"Lark again."
Amanda closed her eyes.
"They revived the shell."
Elena asked the detective to preserve the credential records immediately.
Willow watched everyone move around the single word Lark and realized the past was not returning by accident.
Someone had intentionally taken an old method, an old company name, and an old fear and put them back into circulation.
Richard did not merely repeat himself.
He trusted old crimes because they had worked the first time.
That might become his weakness.
People who believe they have already gotten away with something rarely imagine the second attempt will be watched more closely.
Amanda walked to it slowly.
"No."
She touched the bare shelf.
"No, no, no."
Elena scanned the room.
"What was inside?"
"Bell's copies."
"How much?"
"Twenty years of payments."
"Original founder records."
"Board notes."
"The Donovan file."
Lucas looked at her.
"All of it?"
Amanda shook her head.
"Not all."
Everyone stopped.
She looked at Willow.
"I learned not to keep truth in one place."
Willow stepped closer.
"What do you still have?"
Amanda reached under the collar of her sweater.
Around her neck was a thin chain.
She pulled out a tiny brass key.
"The real key."
The one taken from her coat had been bait.
Even Michael smiled faintly.
Amanda looked toward the empty cabinet.
"They just stole twelve boxes of copies."
"Copies of what?" the detective asked.
Amanda's eyes went cold.
"Copies of records that are sitting in a bank vault Richard Sterling does not know exists."
Lucas stared at her.
"Which bank?"
Amanda looked at him for a long moment.
"You don't get to know yet."
He flinched.
While Amanda spoke to the detective, Willow walked to the wrecked Volvo and looked through the shattered rear window.
A canvas tote bag had spilled across the back seat.
Inside were ordinary things.
A paperback.
A grocery receipt.
A pair of reading glasses.
The normality disturbed Willow more than the damage.
Amanda had not been living like a spy.
She had been living like a woman who bought groceries and carried books, while keeping evidence because powerful people had made ordinary life impossible.
Lucas came to stand several feet away.
"She always kept emergency cash in the glove box," he said quietly.
Willow did not look at him.
"Did you know why?"
Lucas swallowed.
"She said she never wanted to be trapped without a way to leave."
"And what did you think that meant?"
"I thought she was punishing me."
Willow turned then.
"Maybe she was protecting herself from you."
Lucas looked at the crushed car.
"I know that now."
The detective began taking a formal statement.
Willow stood aside with Michael.
"She doesn't trust him."
Michael watched Lucas.
"Would you?"
Willow did not answer.
Her phone buzzed.
A message from Helena.
CALL ME NOW.
Willow called.
Helena answered immediately.
"The gallery alarm went off."
Willow's heart jumped.
"Are you there?"
"No."
"Police are."
"The back window is broken."
"What's missing?"
Helena's breathing sounded fast.
"Your office was searched."
Willow closed her eyes.
"The client files?"
"Some."
"But that's not the weird part."
"What is?"
"They left every laptop."
"They left the cash box."
"They left the paintings."
Willow looked at Michael.
"Then what did they take?"
Helena hesitated.
"The blue binder from your home renovation."
Willow frowned.
"Why would anyone want that?"
"I don't know."
Then Helena's voice dropped.
"But there was an envelope inside it from Sterling Family Trust."
Willow went cold.
"What envelope?"
"The one you signed after your wedding."
Willow stared at nothing.
She remembered a stack of papers Lucas had brought to the gallery four years earlier.
Insurance forms.
Beneficiary updates.
Trust acknowledgments.
She had signed where yellow tabs told her to sign.
"Helena."
"Yeah?"
"Was that envelope open?"
"No."
Willow looked at Lucas across the garage.
May you like
He was watching Amanda give her statement.
"It is now."
