Page 73 of Penny for Your Saints

There’s almost a glimmer of pity for Louise that surfaces before I remember my ultimate goal; the truth behind the Zeitnot virus—and retribution for those who took that which was most precious to me. And so, I use my words to cut once more.

“There was a vacation home, very small, very private,” I say softly, sweetly.

“There was a vacation home, but it wasn’t part of their assets after death—I’d know, I was the executor of their estate.” Louise’s eyes darken and she bares her teeth, but there’s a gentle tic-ing in her cheek that lets me know she’s wrestling with her own doubt.

“Just because the property wasn’t included in the estate paperwork that your parents furnished for you doesn’t mean they don’t still own it.” I snort dismissively, drinking in thefumes of her rage as her scent vaporizes with the heat of anger—savoring the crisp, tartness of the green apple like a fine wine.

“I would know if—” she starts, but stutters, leaving me room to cut in.

“If they still owned it?” I raise a brow.

“It’s an empirical exercise, even if the house is—say, technically owned by a shell company that doesn’t readily lead back to your parents, and that said vacation home is actually just sitting there, exactly as your parents left it—waiting for just such a moment where you, and only you, would know where it was? How to access it? What secrets it might hold…”

I watch the fingers on her left hand curl into a fist, undoubtedly fantasizing about serving me a knuckle sandwich at this very moment.

“Just one problem…” Louise pauses before adding as evenly as she can, “I’m not the only person who knows about the cottage.”

“Yeah, your uncle helped your dad build it like forty years ago, but we’re not worried about him. Plus, he probably thought exactly the same thing you did—wasn’t included in their estate at the time of death, must have sold it—too crazy with grief to follow up on something that seemed to so clearly already be gone.”

Louise opens her mouth to say something, but either thinks better of it—or can’t find the words to articulate the myriad of feelings coloring her shifting features; worrying brows, chewed then pursed lips, and grinding teeth all lending to the general feeling of unease.

Eventually she shakes herself off, comforted by Caz—a silent watcher in all of this, as he lays a hand over her knee—scooting himself down the bench seat until his hip and thigh press against hers in a gesture of affectionate support.

“Fine, we go to the cottage after we break into the storage unit—if it’s all as you say, I’ll be able to get us there and get us in,” she says with a cold finality.

When Tin-tin and I get back with the suppressants and scent blockers, the cabin is looking neat and tidy— our belongings packed and ready to go; a lunch of potato soup and mysterious spicy jerky, laid out on the large wooden farm table.

We take a few moments to inject Louise and Tin-tin with their loading doses of scent blockers and make sure both wash down their suppressant tablets with a last icy cold cup of water pumped from the little lodge sink—we do our dishes and put them away on the wire rack, and pack out of our temporary home and heat haven for the last several days, a long drive to the coast awaiting us after our snowy trek to the car.

It’s about five hours into the drive when Louise suddenly sits bolt upright in the back seat—pressed between Tin-tin and I, her head lifting from my shoulder with a start as she asks breathlessly.

“Wait, all of you can swim? Right?”

Caz looks nervously into the rear view mirror, his icy blue eyes sparkling with nascent fear.

“Uh, I mean, I can doggy paddle and I can float on my back if I try real hard—but I have a low-key, high-key thalassophobia so…” he trails off.

“I’m an excellent swimmer. Why?” Quentin answers suspiciously.

Though neither Frank nor I have had a chance to answer the question, I am a very strong swimmer and I know Frank not only to be superb over long distances even in extreme conditions but also a skilled diver. Much like Quentin, I too wish to know why this has become a sudden concern.

“Well, the good news is that it doesn’t quite qualify as ‘open; ocean—it’s more of a sound between the mainland and the island just at the end of Windy Neck, not far from the beach. Probably a little less than a mile by zodiac or small motorboat,” Louise explains as Caz turns pale green.

“If we weren’t trying to be all stealthy about it—we could have driven down Windy Neck itself at low tide and walked out to the island on the sandbar, but—if we want to get to the cottage unseen, at night during calm waters with a paddled zodiac would be the best method of approach. Obviously the landscape changes a bit if we have Saints who sink like stones.”

“Caz will be fine. We’ll stop at a bait and tackle or outdoor store and pick up a little floaty vest as insurance.”

“Yeah, better pick up a boat, too. There will be stuff at the dock between the mainland and Windy Neck, but the locals will absolutely notice—and local harbor patrol has nothing better to do than to follow up on whatever the local Karen or Robert has to report,” Louise adds, everyone making noises of ascent.

The ‘STOR-WITH-US’ is our first stop, even before the sports store or bait and tackle. Frank runs distraction at the main desk while Quentin slips easily into the maze of corrugated metal roll-up doors, using his set of delicate lock picks to break into the unit in record time.

Though Caz sits, waiting behind the wheel of our getaway car, I back Tin-tin and Loulu up—following them into the unit to be another set of hands to move items quickly; to help carry out our bounty if needed.

Surprisingly, there’s almost nothing in the unit, a few dusty banker’s boxes and an unusually ornate silk potted tree caked in dust and cobwebs.

Louise pops the top off two of the banker's boxes and goes very still as she lifts an ancient, thick silver plastic laptop from its confines.

Quentin and I pull the tops off the other boxes, but they only yield a couple of corporate trophy glass sculptures and an old Lillian Vernon catalog stained by rainwater and age.

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