5 - Lane
Lane
Spending the day with the guys instead of working like I'd intended had given me a sense of clarity.
I hadn't expected to enjoy the labor part of Bear's plan as much as I did, or to feel as comfortable as I did. It was strange how that single morning managed to make me feel just a tad more at home than I'd felt since moving in here.
And maybe it was that surge of newfound confidence that drove me to corner Dax the next day, against my better judgment.
But I hadn't forgotten what I’d witnessed between him and the two strangers.
I hadn't imagined the hostile tension between them, or the thickness of the envelope he'd handed over.
None of that boded well and it was just another source of stress I knew I had to eliminate.
Bear and Silas were still unloading equipment from the truck when I grabbed Dax's elbow and pulled him into a corner of the living room. He looked at me with slight surprise, then the same knowing smirk he'd worn when he was helping me with the sandbags.
“If this is your way of trying to score some privacy with me, I highly suggest you look for better locations,” he said breezily. “This isn't exactly inconspicuous.”
“Funny,” I said deadpan. But whatever expression I was wearing must've given me away because Dax's smirk melted off his face.
“Look, I wasn't planning on saying anything before but I can't stop thinking about something. You the other day, getting into it with a man and older woman right outside my house.”
Dax's face soured instantly, like he'd just sucked on a particularly tart lemon.
“What you do in your personal life isn't any of my business, but the second it starts taking place on my property–” I began.
“You're right. It's none of your business,” he snapped, his attitude suddenly moving from playful arrogance to a coldness that caught me off guard. “I'm your contractor and you're the person writing my checks. That's it, got it?”
He didn't even give me a chance to say anything before storming off with a thundercloud over his head.
I didn't move an inch, stunned at the exchange that had just taken place. A flurry of emotions stirred up inside me, and instead of picking them apart and driving myself crazy with even more questions, I simply grabbed my things and headed for the safety of my office.
I let the chaos of the day wash over me from the second I stepped into the Daley, but it wasn't enough. I kept replaying the exchange with Dax over and over in my head.
It wasn't just the slight sting to my ego that bugged me. It was the nature of the switch-up. It wasn't like Dax at all. It made me think of Terry's practiced anger and how it was obviously a facade for something more fragile.
What was it that Dax could possibly be hiding?
Bear had been so sure that he was a reliable guy and that his past was well enough buried to not come up as a problem in the present.
And from what I could tell, Bear was a pretty good judge of character.
He had an uncanny knack for seeing straight through the bullshit most people set up, at least when it came to me.
The guy could definitely have been a hell of a lawyer.
But how well did that discernment hold up when it came to Dax? There was that fight they had outside my house as well. Each piece of information was like a puzzle piece I was trying to line up with one another, trying to suss out a bigger picture. I wasn't sure I had enough pieces yet.
I hadn't noticed just how low I was starting to feel about all this until Nance popped into my office with coffee, a box of bagels and, most intriguing of all, a file.
My eyes snagged on it immediately, bypassing even the bagels. It was suspiciously thick.
Nance slid the food and coffee onto my desk first, then ceremonially dropped the file in front of me.
“What's this?” I asked, instantly picking up the file and beginning to leaf through it. My eyes bulged at what I read.
Nance just hummed in pride, rewarding herself with one of the bagels.
This file was practically bursting with information about none other than Sandy Manning. Nance had left no stone unturned, and just from a cursory glance I could tell that there was more to this man than even I'd expected.
“Well?” she asked expectantly.
“How did you even find all of this?” I breathed, my eyes scanning the pages.
“Your guy has a very long paper trail. Doesn't seem like he knows much about covering his tracks other than throwing money at people to be quiet. But even if people don't talk, money does.”
“Nance, I really can't thank you enough. This is perfect,” I said, looking up to see her smiling at me.
“I do what I can,” she said. But then she grew suddenly quiet, her voice dropping to a whisper and her smile disappearing.
“Lane, I just have to warn you. When I started this deep-dive, I was under the impression that this man was just some old fart who had too much time on his hands and an ax to grind.
But the more I got into it, the more I started seeing certain things that raised my concern.
Some of the stuff he's involved in…there are powerful people he's gotten himself acquainted with. Be careful with this.”
My head whipped up from the file and I saw Nance chewing on her bottom lip, concern written on her features.
“I promise I'll be okay. You don't have to worry about me,” I reassured her.
She didn't look entirely reassured, but she nodded once at me anyway before leaving me to my work for the day.
Seeing the file had already started brightening up my day but as I read more of it between my meetings and cases and emails, I began to understand the full depth of what Nancy had been trying to say.
There was the expected fare: shell companies, kickbacks, zoning fraud. A speeding ticket or two which, well done Nance.
But the worst of it was the laundering records. Sandy's associates spread far beyond the cozy corners of Logan Square. He had affiliations with several known members of a high-profile syndicate operating across Chicagoland.
My blood turned to ice. If that wasn't concerning enough, the address and unit number plastered all over didn't belong just to Sandy.
It made mention of mine too. Uncle Ricky's signature was copied in several places, officially tying in my current home with whatever ploys and schemes Sandy was cooking up in that deplorable brain of his.
While these documents provided some sort of outline, the actual details of just how Uncle Ricky was involved were nowhere to be found, but that didn't stop the sinking feeling in my stomach from making me want to yack up the bagels I'd polished for lunch.
I didn't want to believe that the man who'd supported me for all these years, and the only family I had who actually treated me like family, could possibly have been involved with this.
But I didn't know how he fit just yet, which meant there was no room to panic for now. And regardless, I was eternally grateful to Nance that I was even able to hold the file in the first place. I had no doubt that this would be the perfect leverage to shut Sandy up once and for all.
Hours passed and I was finally getting ready for my final court appearance of the day, a preliminary hearing when Nancy came to greet me before clocking out.
“Did you get anywhere with the Manning situation?" she asked as I shrugged on my blazer.
“Not yet,” I said truthfully. “Though you weren't kidding about the seriousness of that file. I wasn't expecting some of that.”
“No kidding. Anyway, at least you have three big, strong contractors to protect you if your sniffing around angers the wrong people. Speaking of which,” she wiggled her eyebrows mischievously. “Do you think you could hook me up with one of their contacts?”
I blinked in surprise. “Why?”
“No real reason. Just thought maybe I'd have better luck. Every time I ask for an update it's always the same old pile of nothing from your end.”
I crumpled up a piece of paper and tossed it at her, and she deftly dodged its arc.
“Stay out of my backyard,” I said, wagging a finger at her. “If you want to find playthings of your own, go look elsewhere.”
“Religious levels of greed, I swear,” Nancy said, clicking her tongue. “Good luck with the preliminary.”
*
I got back home just as Silas and Bear were getting into the truck.
Dax was clearly already gone, his bike nowhere to be seen.
A sharp, unexpected pang of disappointment bit into me, and I tried to pretend I couldn't recognize the feeling.
When they saw me, Silas immediately gave a big wave, then jogged the rest of the way to meet me.
We made some small talk about the day's progress and he asked me about how court went and the entire time I just kept eyeing the truck in the background, feeling embarrassingly sad that they were planning on leaving so early.
Well, it wasn't exactly early. But with the storm-level weather we'd been dealing with lately, Bear had thought it necessary to make sure that there were no loose ends that could be wrecked by the wind or rain.
Which meant that for the last week or so, I'd grown used to having the Cornerstone contractors around for a few hours after work.
Bear came up to join us, his hands buried in his pockets.
“So you guys are done for the night, then,” I said, testing the waters.
“Yeah,” Bear confirmed. My stomach sank. “We finished pretty early and everything's looking good.”
“It’s gonna be odd spending a night all by myself again,” I confessed, adding a laugh to the end of the sentence so it sweetened the bitterness. “It does make me a bit nervous. I've grown accustomed to having you guys around every time something breaks or bursts around the house.”
“You'll be fine,” Bear said, the point cartwheeling over his head. “The weather is holding up pretty nice so there shouldn't be any issues. If there's a problem with something else, we'll be here at the crack of dawn to sort it out.”
“Yeah,” I said weakly. “That's great.”
I was running out of ideas to try and get them to stay without sounding like an actual psycho, but nothing worked and it didn't take long until I was inside my house by myself, the Cornerstone truck long gone.
I went through my nightly routine like a zombie, barely paying attention to anything else even as my mind was buzzing with scattered thoughts.
It didn't get any better by the time I finally slunk into bed, still shivering beneath three blankets.
As I lay there, staring up at the ceiling with chattering teeth, I tried to wade through the mental clutter.
Why was I suddenly so apprehensive to stay by myself? I'd been doing it for most of my life by this point. The answer dawned on me, the reason instantly connecting with several other concerns.
It was because for the first time in forever, I was afraid.
I felt like the unit I was living in had been marked with a giant flashing sign. I had no idea that this house had been involved in illegal activities, used as only God knows what and that unknown variable alone ushered in more anxiety than I was willing to cope with.
That brought me to Uncle Ricky. I was desperate to know how he fit into all this and what his relationship had been to someone like Sandy. Because the Uncle Ricky I knew would never have gotten involved with a syndicate. He was the sort of man who never even earned a speeding ticket in his life.
Maybe there was a side to him that I just wasn't aware of. People were more complicated than what would be comfortable. Look at Dax.
Dax…
There was a prime example of a man I couldn't read. One minute he was full of snark and banter, and the next he treated me like something he stepped into the house and couldn't even stand having on his shoe.
Maybe I was foolish for even thinking I understood anything about him. Maybe I was foolish for thinking I knew Uncle Ricky or for even taking on this house. Maybe my mother was right.
Her text loomed at the epicenter of my mind's storm, the distillation of all the insecurities and fears I'd been running from now nesting in the most vulnerable of my thoughts.
That was probably why I wanted the guys to stay. It was the quiet that terrified me the most because it left me wide open and waiting for the worst of those fears to swallow me up.
Dax, Uncle Ricky, Sandy, the syndicate. What had I actually gotten myself into?
I rolled over to my side and pulled my limbs into the fetal position. I could already tell that I'd be getting very little sleep tonight.