Chapter 5 - The Woman He Was Supposed to Ignore
The ring changed the shape of the mystery.
Until that moment, the engraved symbol had belonged to ammunition.
A maker's mark.
A threat.
A trail of metal buried beneath Orson's skin.
But the same mark inside his mother's ring meant the symbol existed long before the shooting.
I took the ring to a private workroom Orson kept in the hotel for watchmakers who serviced his collection. Under stronger magnification, I cleaned the inner band with a soft wooden pick and alcohol.
More engraving appeared.
Not decorative.
Numbers.
17 - 3 - 11.
Then two letters.
H.B.
Orson stood beside me with his sleeves rolled up, the black glove back on his right hand.
"Mean anything?"
"Not yet."
I rotated the ring.
There was a hairline seam beneath the setting.
My pulse increased.
"This ring has been opened before."
"It's a ring."
"No. I mean literally opened. The setting is hollow."
He leaned closer.
"Is that normal?"
"For Victorian poison rings, mourning rings, message rings - yes. For this design? Not usually."
"Can you open it?"
"Probably."
"Do it."
I looked at him.
"You hired me to repair it without changing anything."
"I am revising the job."
"Clients are exhausting."
"So I'm told."
It took twenty minutes.
I warmed the setting slightly, loosened an old mechanical catch hidden beneath one shoulder, and lifted the center cluster.
Inside was a tightly rolled piece of paper no wider than a matchstick.
Orson stopped breathing.
I used tweezers to remove it.
The paper was brittle with age.
We unrolled it beneath glass.
The handwriting was not my grandfather's.
Orson recognized it immediately.
"My mother."
The note contained only one sentence.
IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO ME, H.B. KNOWS WHAT ALDRIC DID IN BUILDING 17.
I looked at Orson.
He had gone pale.
"Your mother knew about Building 17?"
"She died twelve years ago."
"How?"
"Car accident."
Neither of us said anything.
We did not need to.
A second old death had just become a question.
"Who is H.B.?" I asked.
Orson turned away.
"I don't know."
The answer came too fast.
"You do."
His shoulders stiffened.
"Rosie."
"You absolutely do."
He looked back at me.
"Helen Bell."
I stared.
Bell.
The fake name my grandfather wrote in his letter.
Mr. Bell.
"Who was she?"
"My mother's closest friend."
"Alive?"
"I haven't seen her in fifteen years."
"Why?"
Orson's expression closed.
"Because after my mother died, Helen accused Aldric of causing the accident."
"And you didn't believe her."
"There was no proof."
"What happened to her?"
"Aldric said she left Chicago."
I stared at him.
"You realize how bad that sounds now."
"Yes."
Kellen entered the room.
"We have a problem."
"Add it to the list," I said.
He ignored me.
"Aldric's council meeting was moved up. It starts in forty minutes at the Belmont Club. He's got twelve senior captains there already."
Orson picked up his jacket.
"Then we go."
Kellen looked at me.
"She doesn't."
Orson paused.
"She's safer with us."
"A room full of armed captains who think she's compromising you is safer?"
"Yes."
I raised a hand.
"I appreciate being discussed like an unusually fragile package, but I can make my own decision."
Kellen's stare was flat.
"And your decision?"
"I want to hear what Aldric says."
"Terrible decision."
"Probably."
Orson held my coat open.
"Stay beside me."
I slipped my arms into it.
"You say that a lot."
"You ignore it a lot."
"We all have hobbies."
The Belmont Club occupied the top floor of an old private building near the river.
No sign advertised it.
No public directory listed it.
The elevator required a key.
When the doors opened, conversation stopped.
Twelve men sat around a long walnut table.
Most were over fifty.
All looked dangerous in different ways.
At the head sat Aldric Dramore.
He was seventy-one, broad-shouldered, silver-haired, and elegant enough to look more like a retired senator than the man accused of ordering a mutilating assassination attempt.
His eyes went first to Orson.
Then to me.
Then to Kellen.
He smiled.
"Nephew."
Orson walked into the room.
"Uncle."
Aldric's gaze dropped to the black glove.
"I heard you've had an eventful day."
"You seem well informed."
"People worry about you."
"Do they?"
Aldric gestured to the table.
"Sit."
Orson remained standing.
So did I.
Aldric looked at me again.
"Rosie Fenomore."
My stomach tightened.
"We've never met," I said.
"No. But I knew your grandfather."
The room disappeared around me.
"You knew him?"
"Walter was a gifted craftsman. Paranoid near the end, but gifted."
Orson's face changed.
"You never told me that."
Aldric shrugged.
"You never asked."
"Did you give him custom ammunition to inspect?"
Every man at the table became still.
Aldric's smile faded.
"Is that what this is about?"
"Answer the question."
"Be careful, Orson. Pain makes men desperate for simple explanations."
"My pain has a metal fragment with an engraving inside it. Her grandfather kept a matching casing."
Aldric looked at me.
For the first time, I saw the man beneath the polished suit.
Cold.
Calculating.
"Walter should have destroyed that years ago."
Orson took one step forward.
Several captains shifted.
Aldric lifted a hand.
"Don't be theatrical. I sent the ammunition to Walter for inspection. That is true. I did not shoot you."
"Who made it?"
Aldric smiled again.
"A man who has been dead for eleven years."
"Name."
"Hector Bell."
My head snapped up.
H.B.
Orson's mother's note.
Aldric saw the reaction.
And knew he had said too much.
"Helen Bell's husband," Orson said slowly.
Aldric's eyes hardened.
"Yes."
"My mother wrote that H.B. knew what you did in Building 17."
Silence exploded through the room.
Aldric did not move.
Not even a blink.
Then he looked at me.
"Where did you find that?"
I said nothing.
"In the ring," Orson answered.
Aldric's face changed.
Only slightly.
But enough.
He had known the ring mattered.
"You broke it," I said.
Everyone looked at me.
Aldric's gaze sharpened.
"Excuse me?"
"The ring didn't fracture from age. Someone twisted the band with pliers. There were compression marks beneath the old scratches. You damaged it deliberately because you were looking for the compartment."
Orson turned toward him.
"You sent me the ring."
I looked at Orson.
"What?"
"It arrived at my house two weeks ago in an unmarked package. I assumed it came from storage."
Aldric's smile vanished.
I understood before Orson did.
"He sent it because he thought the compartment was empty," I said. "He had already searched it."
"Then why send it to me?" Orson asked.
"To see if you reacted. To see if you knew what used to be inside."
Aldric pushed back his chair.
"Enough."
Orson's voice dropped.
"Sit down."
Aldric laughed.
"You think a damaged hand and a jeweler make you a detective now?"
The insult landed harder than it should have.
Orson did not react.
I did.
"No," I said. "The jeweler is the one noticing all the things you missed."
Aldric looked at me.
Several captains lowered their eyes to hide smiles.
That was probably the moment Aldric decided I was no longer an inconvenience.
I was a threat.
He leaned toward Orson.
"You always did have a weakness for damaged things."
Orson's face became frighteningly calm.
"Careful."
Aldric's eyes moved to me.
"She isn't family. She isn't one of us. She's a broke shopkeeper who stumbled into something she doesn't understand."
"And yet here you are," I said, "arguing with me."
The room went completely silent.
Aldric smiled without warmth.
"You have spirit. Your grandfather did too, before he learned fear."
My blood turned cold.
"Did you threaten him?"
"I gave him advice."
"Did you kill him?"
Orson turned sharply toward me.
Aldric's expression did not change.
"Your grandfather died of a stroke."
"That isn't an answer."
"It is the only one you're getting."
Orson placed his left hand on the table.
"The council is over."
Aldric laughed.
"You don't dismiss my meeting."
"I just did."
One by one, the captains looked between them.
Then an older man near the end of the table stood.
"I'm leaving."
Another followed.
Then another.
Not because they had chosen Orson.
Because none of them wanted to be trapped in the room when blood started.
Within two minutes, only Aldric remained with three loyal men.
Orson turned to leave.
Aldric called after him.
"Ask the girl why her grandfather never told her who really paid for Fenomore Jewelry."
I stopped.
Orson stopped.
Aldric smiled.
"There. Finally something Walter didn't leave in a little box."
I turned slowly.
"What are you talking about?"
"Your grandfather was broke in 1998. That shop should have disappeared. Someone paid the mortgage, renovated the workshop, and bought him twenty years of silence."
My throat tightened.
"Who?"
Aldric's smile widened.
"Orson's mother."
I stared at him.
"Why would she do that?"
Aldric's answer changed everything again.
"Because Walter Fenomore saved her life once."
Then he looked at Orson.
"And because he knew why your father really died."
We left with more questions than we had brought.
In the elevator, no one spoke.
The doors opened into the underground garage.
I took three steps toward the SUV.
A van slammed around the corner.
Two masked men jumped out.
Kellen reached for his weapon.
Orson shoved me behind a concrete pillar.
A stun grenade exploded.
White light swallowed the garage.
Hands grabbed me.
I fought.
I bit someone hard enough to taste blood.
A cloth covered my mouth.
The last thing I heard before darkness took me was Orson shouting my name.
When I woke, I was tied to a chair.
Aldric stood in front of me.
And beside him sat an old woman I had never seen before.
She looked at me with tears in her eyes.
"Rosie Fenomore," she whispered.
Then she turned toward Aldric.
"You promised me you'd never involve Walter's granddaughter."
May you like
Aldric smiled.
"Helen, my promises have never been worth much."
