Chapter 8 - Where the Birds Slept
The music box was in Grace’s room over the garage.
At the estate.
Behind a door Adrian could lock.
She called Ortiz before she called anyone else.
The detective told her not to go alone.
Two hours later, Grace returned with a deputy to collect her belongings under an arrangement made through Adrian’s attorney.
Adrian waited in the courtyard.
No whiskey.
No smile.
“You always did like an audience.”
Grace walked past him.
He followed far enough for the deputy to turn.
“Give her room, sir.”
“My property.”
“And an agreed collection of belongings.”
Grace climbed the narrow stairs.
The apartment looked smaller than she remembered.
A bed.
A hot plate.
A chair she had dragged in from the curb.
For four months, she had called it enough because Owen slept two buildings away.
Her clothes lay in garbage bags.
The framed photograph of her and Nora was facedown.
Grace didn’t stop for it.
She opened the cabinet above the sink.
The box was there.
Chipped green paint.
Two crooked swallows.
Their father had carved it before his hands became too stiff to hold a knife.
Nora kept treasures under the loose velvet lining when they were girls.
Movie tickets.
Birthday money.
Notes nobody else was supposed to read.
Grace lifted the lid.
The little metal tune stumbled through three notes.
The velvet sat flat.
She didn’t pull it up.
Instead, she put the entire box in her tote and carried it downstairs.
Adrian watched the bag.
“What’s that?”
“My father’s.”
“You should be careful about taking things that aren’t yours.”
She stopped on the last stair.
“Then you should’ve been careful about marrying my sister.”
His face changed.
Only for a second.
Enough.
At the sheriff’s office, Ortiz photographed the box before lifting the lining.
A small flash drive rested beneath it.
Grace’s knees weakened.
The detective didn’t plug it into her own computer.
She called the examiner handling the case.
Grace waited in a plastic chair while the drive was documented and secured.
It took hours before anyone could tell her what was there.
Not a confession.
Not a video of the lake.
Bank records.
Invoices.
Copies of emails.
And a short recording Nora had made in her office.
Ortiz let Grace hear one part.
Adrian’s voice came through the speaker.
“If you leave with my son, you won’t make it past the water.”
Then Nora spoke.
“That sounds like a threat.”
May you like
Adrian laughed.
“No. That’s me explaining how this ends.”
