Chapter 4 #2
He straightened slowly, letting his gaze drift across the shop. Boxes lined the walls. Estate items lay spread across tables. Shadows pooled in corners that had once felt harmless.
“I want that locket opened the right way,” he continued. “No forcing it. No damage. If Eleanor hid something, she intended it to be found intact.”
“I have some tools upstairs that might work.” Annie rose, then hesitated. “Jack, something else happened earlier. A woman came in with her daughter. Sarah Mitchell.”
The name triggered immediate recognition.
“I know who she is,” he said.
Her eyebrows lifted. “You do?”
“I know where the name sits.” He held her gaze. “Go on.”
“She asked if her little girl could use the bathroom. The child really did seem desperate, but they were back there longer than they should have been.” Annie’s fingers worked the edge of the photograph. “And she kept looking around. Not browsing. Assessing.”
“You think she was gathering information.”
“I think she wasn’t here for antiques.” Annie inhaled slowly. “And now we find out she’s connected to the Blackwood's.”
“You think she scratched the message into the back door?”
She shook her head. “No. That started after she left. You would’ve seen her go into the alley.”
That matched his memory. Sarah Mitchell had exited calmly, walking east, not toward the back lot. Which meant if she was involved, she wasn’t working alone.
“I’ll check the bathroom,” Annie said, already moving.
Jack watched her navigate the tight path between tables and shelves, aware of how easily blind spots formed in a space like this. He followed moments later.
The bathroom showed no immediate disturbance. Clean. Tidy. Old. Cracks in the tile and faint discolorations spoke to time, not tampering. Then he noticed the small drilled hole in the wall beside the toilet. He crouched, peering through it, catching a sliver of daylight from the alley.
A sightline.
Not dangerous by itself. But useful.
“How long has that hole been there?” he asked when they returned to the front.
“Since I moved in. The previous owner said it was for wiring.”
Jack nodded once. “I’ll patch it. Today.”
She studied him. “You think someone used it.”
“I think someone noticed it,” he said. “And that’s enough.”
He pulled out his phone.
“I’m calling Martinez. I want surveillance footage pulled from every street cam on this block going back two weeks, and I want a full background on Sarah Mitchell. Finances. Associates. Family connections. Especially to Richard Henry Mitchell and the Blackwood estate.”
When the call connected, he repeated the instructions, then ended it and remained still for a moment, letting the pieces reorder themselves.
A focused theft. Weeks of surveillance. An attack timed while Annie was at the station. A warning carved into her door. And now a building potentially compromised from the inside.
This wasn’t random violence.
This was containment.
Someone believed something had escaped their control.
“You can’t stay here alone tonight,” Jack said.
“Jack—”
“They marked your building while I stood fifty feet away. They attacked Eric in broad daylight. That tells me they’re testing boundaries. And escalation only moves one direction.”
“This is my home.”
“And it’s exposed,” he replied. “Too many access points. Too many windows. No perimeter control.”
“I’m not running.”
“I’m not asking you to.” His tone stayed even. “I’m adjusting the environment.”
She studied him, conflict tightening her mouth.
“Then I stay,” he said. “Storage room. I can monitor the front and the alley, and the stairs give me a choke point to your apartment.”
“That’s not necessary.”
“Yes, it is.” He met her gaze. “They hurt Eric because of what you found. That means they won’t stop at intimidation.”
Her phone vibrated.
Jack’s followed a second later.
Martinez: Found something. Sarah Mitchell’s great-grandfather was Richard Mitchell. County records confirm he inherited the Blackwood businesses in 1928. Everything.
Jack turned his screen toward Annie.
Her breath caught. “1928. One year after Eleanor disappeared.”
“And five days after Richard’s eighteenth birthday,” Jack said. “Which means Eleanor vanished just in time.”
The shop felt suddenly smaller.
“What if her death wasn’t just about inheritance,” Annie said. “What if it was about preventing exposure?”
Jack nodded slowly. “Then the locket may contain something the family never recovered. And someone alive today believes it can still destroy them.”
She drew the locket out again. “Then we open it. Tonight.”
“Tonight,” he agreed. “But we do it controlled.”
He stepped aside to make another call, arranging for a patrol unit to pass hourly, requesting a fire inspection of the building’s access points, and quietly flagging the alley for unmarked observation.
When he finished, Annie stood watching him, arms wrapped around herself.
“You’re thinking this is bigger than one family,” she said.
“I’m thinking the Blackwood name didn’t survive this long by accident.” He scanned the storefront windows. “Power networks don’t dissolve. They go dormant.”
Silence stretched between them, weighted with what that implied.
Outside, the sun angled lower, throwing amber light across the shop floor, illuminating floating dust that refused to settle.
“Pack essentials,” he said. “Clothes. Documents. Anything you can’t afford to lose.”
Her jaw tightened. “You think they’ll try again.”
“I think they already are.”
Annie exhaled slowly, then nodded.
As she turned toward the stairs, Jack remained where he was, eyes moving, cataloging exits, sightlines, and shadows. The message on her door replayed in his mind. The timing of Eric’s assault. The way surveillance had tightened around her without her noticing.
Someone believed the past was about to surface.
Jack intended to make sure it did—on their terms.