Chapter 2 - The Second Cup of Coffee
I didn't tell Hannah about the photograph.
That decision lasted exactly eleven minutes.
We were walking outside when she stopped beneath the café awning and looked straight at me.
“You've been somewhere else since you checked your phone.”
“Business.”
“Dangerous business?”
“You ask direct questions.”
“You avoid them.”
Chicago traffic rolled past us, horns bouncing between buildings. Hannah adjusted the canvas tote on her shoulder.
Marcus waited twenty feet away.
The black SUV idled by the curb.
Hannah stared at it.
“Please tell me that's not yours.”
“It is.”
“Of course it is.”
“What did you expect?”
“A Honda.”
I almost smiled.
Then Marcus approached.
“Sir.”
Hannah glanced between us.
Marcus lowered his voice.
“South Yard is secure.”
“Anyone leave?”
“No.”
“The man across the street?”
“Lost him near Wabash.”
Hannah heard enough.
Her expression changed.
“What man?”
I turned toward Marcus.
“Give us a minute.”
Marcus stepped away.
Hannah folded her arms.
“Nathan.”
There was something strange about hearing my name in her voice. She didn't say it cautiously.
“You don't need to worry.”
“I decide what I need to worry about.”
Fair.
I took out my phone and showed her the photograph.
The humor vanished from her face.
She enlarged the image.
“Those are ours.”
“You're certain?”
“Yes. Those labels come from our donation coordinator.”
“How many boxes?”
“We were expecting forty-eight.”
“From whom?”
“An educational nonprofit in Wisconsin.”
“Name?”
“Bright Futures Network.”
I knew dozens of shell corporations.
The name sounded exactly like one.
“Did you pay for the shipment?”
“No. Donation.”
“Who arranged it?”
Hannah hesitated.
“Our board chairman.”
“Name?”
“Calvin Ross.”
That name I knew.
Not personally.
But enough.
Calvin Ross was an attorney who had represented three development companies trying to buy distressed property on Chicago's west side.
One of those properties sat two blocks from Bridge House.
I slid the phone into my pocket.
“Don't go there tonight.”
“What?”
“Bridge House.”
Her expression hardened.
“I have class at six.”
“Cancel it.”
“No.”
“Hannah.”
“You don't get to order me around because we had coffee.”
“This has nothing to do with coffee.”
“Then explain it.”
I looked toward Marcus.
He already knew what I was thinking.
Someone had routed a shipment through my South Yard under Bridge House's name.
Maybe the books really were books.
Maybe they weren't.
Either way, people didn't accidentally use my warehouses.
“I'll take you there.”
Hannah blinked.
“You'll what?”
“Drive you.”
“I have a bus pass.”
“I noticed.”
That earned me a glare.
Thirty minutes later, Hannah Cole was sitting beside me in the back of a vehicle that cost more than Bridge House's annual technology budget.
She looked uncomfortable enough to jump from it at a stoplight.
“You could sell this car,” she said.
“Yes.”
“And fund twenty community programs.”
“Probably.”
She looked at me.
“That doesn't bother you?”
“Should it?”
“I don't know yet.”
There it was again.
No condemnation.
Just evaluation.
People had spent years deciding who I was before meeting me.
Hannah seemed determined to make up her own mind.
Bridge House occupied an old brick building between a laundromat and a small grocery store.
Children's artwork covered the front windows.
A hand-painted sign read:
EVERYONE DESERVES A PLACE TO LEARN.
Hannah reached for the door.
“Stay here.”
I stared at her.
She pointed toward Marcus and two other security men.
“You bringing all of them inside will terrify the kids.”
“That building may be connected to something happening in my warehouse.”
“And those kids aren't.”
I looked at Marcus.
He sighed almost invisibly.
“Two outside,” I said. “Marcus comes with us.”
“Fine.”
Inside, everything changed.
Hannah became someone else.
Kids called her name from every direction.
A boy carrying textbooks shouted, “Ms. Cole, Miguel stole my calculator.”
“I borrowed it!” another voice yelled.
“You borrowed it without asking,” Hannah called back.
“That sounds like stealing with extra words,” I said.
Three teenagers laughed.
Hannah pointed at me.
“Don't encourage them.”
An elderly woman waved from behind a desk.
“Hannah, the printer's possessed again.”
“It hates me, Mrs. Alvarez.”
“Everybody hates that printer.”
A little girl approached Hannah holding a torn workbook.
Hannah knelt instantly.
The entire room disappeared for her.
I watched her repair the girl's book with tape.
No hurry.
No impatience.
No performance.
I couldn't remember the last time I had watched someone give attention so freely.
Then Marcus spoke quietly beside me.
“You see the camera?”
I followed his gaze.
One new security camera was positioned above the hallway.
Too new.
Too expensive.
“Hannah,” I called.
She looked over.
“Did you install that?”
She followed my finger.
“No.”
Her face tightened.
We checked the others.
Three cameras.
None belonged to Bridge House.
Marcus found the recording device hidden inside a locked maintenance closet.
Someone had been watching the building.
Hannah went pale.
“Why?”
“I don't know.”
“That answer is getting old.”
“So is the situation.”
Her phone rang.
She looked at the screen.
“Calvin.”
“Put it on speaker.”
“No.”
“Hannah.”
“This is my workplace.”
“Exactly.”
She answered normally.
“Hi, Calvin.”
His voice carried faintly.
“Hannah, I'm checking on tomorrow's board meeting. Also, I heard the book delivery may have been delayed.”
Hannah's eyes met mine.
“How did you hear that?”
Silence.
Then Calvin laughed.
“The donor contacted me.”
“What donor?”
“Bright Futures.”
“Who specifically?”
Another pause.
“I'll forward the information.”
“Please do.”
He changed subjects quickly.
After the call ended, Hannah stared at her phone.
“I've known Calvin four years.”
“How well?”
“He helped keep Bridge House open.”
“Or helped himself to Bridge House.”
She bristled.
“You don't know that.”
“No.”
I walked toward the hidden recorder.
“But somebody knew where those books were supposed to go. Somebody knew they were in my warehouse. And somebody installed cameras here.”
Her shoulders lowered.
For the first time since meeting her, Hannah looked frightened.
Not for herself.
“For the kids,” she whispered. “What if someone has been watching the kids?”
I stepped closer.
“They won't anymore.”
Her eyes lifted.
“Don't say things you can't promise.”
“I don't.”
The room had emptied around us as evening classes began down the hall.
Hannah looked at me for a long time.
Then something crashed outside.
Marcus moved instantly.
I pushed Hannah behind me.
A car accelerated away from the curb.
On the sidewalk lay a shattered brick.
Wrapped around it was a piece of paper.
Marcus picked it up.
One sentence had been typed across the center.
MERCER DOESN'T BELONG HERE.
Hannah read it over my shoulder.
Then looked at me.
“This isn't about Bridge House, is it?”
I wanted to tell her no.
But I was done lying to her.
“I think it's about both of us.”
And for the first time, Hannah looked at me not as a difficult blind date or a wealthy stranger.
She looked at me as a door she'd accidentally opened.
Behind that door was a world I had spent twenty years surviving.
May you like
Someone had just invited her inside.
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