17. Cassie
CASSIE
The tape recorder shut off on its own, leaving a silence every bit as profound as the sound of my mother’s voice filling the room.
I didn’t realize tears were streaming down my face until Hawk pulled me into his arms and Jagger handed me a paper towel for my running nose.
They let me cry for a few minutes, the echo of my mother’s voice, somehow both familiar and foreign, ringing through my mind.
“You okay, mouse?” Vigo finally asked.
I nodded. “It just… it makes me miss her all over again. I thought I was used to be being without her, but her voice… it just makes her feel so close, and then I realize that she’s not close, that I’ll never hear her voice in person again, and I just get so fucking sad.”
Jagger sat on the couch next to Hawk and me and took my hand. “That’s understandable. You’re allowed to be sad.”
“It’s been so long.” I sniffed. “They’ve been gone for over ten years.”
“Still allowed to be sad,” Jagger said. “There’s no moratorium on grief.”
“Crazy that she left this tape behind,” Vigo said.
“She knew,” I said. “She knew they were after her and dad. Knew Imperium Fratrum might catch up to them.”
Hawk rubbed at his jaw. He’d shaved off his hospital beard as soon as we’d gotten home but sometimes still seemed to be feeling for the scruff that had covered his face.
“It’s weird,” he said.
“What’s weird?” I asked.
“‘Long-stored treasures,’” Hawk murmured. “It’s just… weird.”
“Think it’s a message?” Jagger asked.
I rewound the tape, started it from the beginning, and let it play to the end, this time listening for anything that might point to a clue about Imperium Fratrum.
When I got to the part of my mom’s message that Hawk had mentioned, I rewound the tape again.
“… the information you need to pick up where we left off will require you to uncover long-stored treasures.”
I stopped the tape. “‘Long-stored treasures…’”
Vigo bounced his ball against the wall and caught it. “Maybe it’s about the key.”
I thought about the key that had been hidden with the recorder at the paper mill.“That doesn’t exactly narrow it down.”
It was just a generic silver key.
“Let’s think about this,” Hawk said. “Where would someone hide something that requires a key?”
“A storage unit,” Jagger said. “Or a PO box.”
“What about one of those private boxes at a bank?” I tried to remember what they were called. “Are those still a thing?”
“A safety deposit box,” Hawk said. “Also possible.”
“Could be a lockbox your mom and dad hid somewhere,” Vigo said. “Maybe they buried it or something.”
His ball bounced off the wall like the beat of a drum.
Bounce, bounce, bounce.
I sighed. “This isn’t helping.”
“We need more information,” Jagger said. “There are too many possibilities.”
“What about your parents’ papers?” Hawk asked.
“I’ve been through them a hundred times,” I said. “There was nothing about a storage unit or a PO box or a buried lockbox.”
“That you know of,” Vigo said.
The sound of his ball bouncing off the wall was almost meditative.
Bounce-bounce-bounce.
“Vigo’s right,” Hawk said. “What else is in those boxes? Besides the notes on their investigation into the money transfers?”
I shrugged. “Just… everyday stuff. Checking account statements, car repair receipts, mortgage statements. Nothing important.”
“That you know of,” Vigo said again.
“You think I missed something,” I said.
“It’s possible, isn’t it?” Jagger asked.
I thought about my parents’ papers, still in my room upstairs, and nodded. “It’s possible.”
Vigo’s ball stopped bouncing. “Let’s bring down those boxes.”