Page 13 of The New Couple in 5B

“Has he?”

“Ivan’s daughter, Miss Dana, sought access yesterday, but I couldn’t allow it. She was—quite irate.”

Interesting.

“What was she looking for?”

Abi’s dark, heavy brow wrinkles. “I’m not sure. I told her to connect with you or Mr. Lowan. Did she not?”

“We saw her, but we didn’t discuss the storage unit. She’s angry with us, that Ivan left us the apartment. Don’t take it personally.”

Abi smiles at that. “In my line of work, you learn to never take anything personally.”

I wonder what that means.

“The owners,” I say. “Do they treat you well?”

“Generally, yes,” he says vaguely. Strangely, he glances up at one of the cameras and doesn’t go on. I nod, sensing that I shouldn’t press further.

We’ve come to stand in front of the storage unit, which unlike the others, is meticulously organized. Just boxes lined on metal shelves, each labeled by year or by place. I scan the boxes—Berlin, Paris, London, Iran, Afghanistan, Belarus. I notice right away that a box is gone, a blank space in the neat rows like a missing tooth.

“There’s one missing.”

“So there is,” says Abi, not offering more.

Did Chad take it? Is it up in the apartment somewhere?

I hunt through my tote and fish out my new ring of keys. One of the smaller mystery keys fits right into the lock with a satisfying click.

“I might take some time down here if it’s okay.”

“Of course,” says Abi. “Let me know when I can finish your tour.”

A red blinking light catches my eye again. “Those cameras. Who monitors the video feed?” He’s already told me—but it’s the journalist’s way. Ask the question again to see if the answer is the same.

“The doormen,” says Abi. “There are monitors in the office behind the desk on the ground floor. It’s just for security, of course, to make sure all of our residents are safe.”

“Of course,” I say. “Are the feeds recorded?”

Is there a flicker of hesitation? “No, Ms. Lowan. No recording.”

I let myself into the storage unit, and Abi leaves so quietly that it’s a moment before I notice that he’s gone and I’m all alone.

It feels like an invasion of privacy to start lifting lids on the mottled boxes—portfolios and loose photographs, books of negatives, journals. But what difference does it make now that Ivan’s gone? Besides, we cleaned out his entire apartment—donating things like books and clothes, pots and pans, keeping a box of correspondence and photographs, journals, things we thought Dana might want. Ivan was a minimalist. He wanted little when he lived and had almost nothing of any material value when he died.

A shuffling noise behind me catches my attention, but when I turn there’s nothing. The unblinking eye of the camera stares back at me.

Is it odd that Chad didn’t mention the storage space? I wonder, as I sift through the boxes. He’s notoriously absent-minded. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that he simply forgot. And yet, he’s been here multiple times, according to Abi. Why?

When I come to the empty space for the missing box, I stand staring. A rectangle of black dust had gathered around the box that used to be there, the space where it sat clean and gray. I feel a tingling curiosity to know what box is missing, where it is. I stand a minute, staring in frustration, as if I might will the box back to its rightful place, then finally moving on.

I slide off the lid with Dana’s name on it, and see that there is a letter to her, sealed, on top. I move it aside and sift through a collection of pictures that must be Dana as a child—fair skinned and strawberry blonde, laughing, on a bike, on horseback, running joyfully through what looks like the Tuileries in Paris. Graduation, her wedding announcement, some articles about her work as a photographer—art and fashion in her case. I think she’d want to know that he’d kept all of this.

Chad doesn’t seem in the least concerned about Dana’s loss. But it’s nagging at me. I decide to call her and offer her this olive branch. This idea is easing my guilty conscience some when the lights go out and I’m plunged into total darkness.

“Abi?” I call out, fumbling for my phone, finally finding it. The flashlight feature is no competition for the darkness and shadows all around me. The blackness seems to swallow the meager beam.

Power outage? No, I still see the blinking red light of the camera.

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