Pay Up

Chapter 15:

I said it again because my brain couldn't hold it.

"Pay up."

Colleen had her hands over her face.

"Mom."

"I didn't know," she said. "I swear to God, Ella, I didn't know."

"Didn't know what?"

"I didn't know it was him."

The kitchen was dead silent. Kael was standing by the counter with his phone in his hand. Sierra was in the doorway. Marisol had come in from somewhere and was standing by the sink with her arms crossed.

"Start at the beginning," Kael said. "Slow."

Colleen wiped her face with both hands. She looked like she'd aged ten years in ten minutes.

"I bought the house eight years ago," she said. "With the money. I bought it outright. Cash. In my name. A little place on Tuller Street. Two bedrooms. A garden."

"How much?" Kael said.

"Ninety thousand."

"And the man who sold it to you?"

"I never met him. It was through a lawyer. A woman. She had all the papers. She said the seller was a company that had inherited the property and they wanted a quick sale." Colleen swallowed. "I signed everything. I got the keys. I moved in."

"And for eight years?"

"For eight years I lived there. I worked at a grocery store. I didn't leave the house much. I didn't talk to anybody. I just —" She stopped. "I just wanted somewhere quiet."

"And three weeks ago?"

Colleen's hands started shaking.

"Three weeks ago a man knocked on the door. Middle of the afternoon. I opened it because I thought it was the mailman. But it wasn't. It was a man in a gray suit. He had a clipboard and a folder and he said, 'Mrs. Donnelly, I'm here about the property.'"

"What did he say?" Kael asked.

"He said the lease was up."

"Lease."

"He said the house wasn't mine. He said the deed was in a trust and the trust was held by a company and the company had decided not to renew the tenancy."

"You bought it outright," I said. "You had a deed."

Colleen looked at me.

"I thought I had a deed," she said. "I never read the paperwork. I signed what the lawyer put in front of me and I put it in a drawer and I never looked at it again. That's how stupid I was."

Kael walked to the table. Pulled out a chair and sat down across from her.

"Where's the deed now?" he said.

"In a drawer."

"Where?"

"At the house. The dresser in the back bedroom."

"Then we're gonna need to go get it," Kael said. "Tonight."

"Kael," I said.

He didn't look at me.

"You can't," Colleen said. "He's got people on that street. He said if I tried to come back—"

"Then you're not going," Kael said. "I'm going."

---

I grabbed his arm and pulled him out of the kitchen.

The hallway was dim. Somewhere in the house Lily was still asleep. I could hear her breathing over the baby monitor in the other room.

"No," I said.

"Ella."

"No. You don't get to walk out of here and go to a street your father's got men on and get yourself shot at for a piece of paper."

"It's not a piece of paper. It's the only proof we've got that the house wasn't his."

"You don't know that."

"I know what a deed looks like. If it's in her name, it's in her name. But if the paperwork had a trust attached—"

"Kael." I put both hands on his chest. "Look at me."

He looked at me.

"You just heard the man on the phone," I said. "He called me. He knows I'm here. He knows we're all here. He's not stupid. He's expecting you to come for that deed. He put the idea in your head."

"He put the idea in your mother's head."

"He put it in mine." I pushed him back a step. "That's what he does, Kael. That's what he does. He plants things and he lets people do the work for him. You said it yourself. He's three moves ahead."

Kael's jaw moved.

"So what do you want me to do?" he said. "Sit here?"

"Yes."

"Ella."

"Sit here and sleep and let me think."

"Let you think."

"That's what I said."

Kael looked at me for a long moment.

Then he said, "You think?"

"I think. It's a thing I do."

He almost smiled.

"Okay," he said.

"Okay?"

"Okay. I'll sit. But I'm not sleeping."

"Fine."

"And I'm putting two more men on the gate."

"Fine."

"And nobody leaves this property."

I looked up at him.

"Nobody?" I said.

"Nobody."

"Kael. I need to see the house."

"No."

"Kael."

"No."

I stepped back. Put my hands down.

"Fine," I said. "Then I need something else."

"What?"

"A phone. A different one. A number he doesn't have."

Kael looked at me.

"Why?"

"Because he called me tonight," I said. "And he was in a good mood. He was enjoying himself. He thinks he's got the upper hand." I looked up at him. "So I want to call him back. And I want to ruin his night."

---

Kael said no for about forty-five minutes.

Then he said yes.

He said yes after I explained it three times. I would call a number he didn't know. I would say four sentences. I would hang up. No arguing. No negotiating. No telling him anything he didn't already know.

"What four sentences?" he said.

I told him.

Kael sat with it.

Then he said, "You sure?"

"I'm sure."

He handed me a cheap phone. One of those flip phones out of a drawer in the security room. He said the number was clean. Untraceable. He said the call would go through a switch in the city. He said not to say my name.

I dialed the number.

It rang twice.

"Hello?"

It was him. Same voice. The one that sounded like he was smiling.

"You asked my mother what she did with the money," I said. "She bought a house. You already knew that. So why did you ask?"

A pause. Then a low laugh.

"Because I wanted to see if she'd tell you the truth," he said. "She didn't. She told you a story. She left out the part where the house is in my name."

"It's not in your name."

"No?"

"It's in a trust. And the trust is in a company. And the company's got a shell address in Delaware. I've seen the paperwork."

Silence.

"You've seen the paperwork," he said. Slowly.

"I've seen it."

"You're bluffing."

"Try me."

The silence stretched out. When he spoke again, the smile was gone.

"Where are you?" he said.

"Somewhere you can't reach."

"I can reach anywhere."

"Then come get me."

Silence.

"You think you're clever," he said.

"No," I said. "I think I'm tired. And I think you've been playing a game with my life for twenty-four years and I just found out. And I think the only thing that scares a man like you is a woman who isn't scared of him anymore."

A long pause. Then:

"You're not scared of me?"

"I'm terrified of you," I said. "But I'm not gonna let that stop me."

He was quiet for a long time.

Then he said, "I like you, Ella Rae. I liked your mother too. For a while. She was soft. You're not soft."

"No. I'm not."

"That's a shame. Soft is easier."

"For who?"

"For them."

He hung up.

I stood there with the phone in my hand. My knees were shaking. My hands were steady. Kael was watching me from the doorway with his arms crossed.

"Well?" he said.

"He's coming," I said.

Kael nodded.

"Yeah," he said. "I figured he would."

He walked over and took the phone out of my hand. Set it on the counter.

"Now what?" I said.

"Now we wait."

"For how long?"

Kael looked at me.

"For as long as it takes."

---

I sat in the living room with Lily in my lap. She was awake now, groggy, in her pajamas with her hair in her eyes. She kept putting her hand on my face.

"Mama," she said. "You're sad."

"I'm not sad, baby."

"You're lying."

"You keep catching me."

She laid her head on my chest.

I looked over at the kitchen table. Sierra was sitting there with a cup of coffee and a blanket around her shoulders. Colleen was across from her, staring at the wall.

"Tell me about the house," I said.

Colleen looked at me.

"What?"

"The house. Tuller Street. What's it like?"

She was quiet for a second.

"It's got a porch," she said. "And a garden. Roses. Red roses. The kind that come back every year. And there's a tree in the backyard. A big one. When I was there I used to sit under it and read."

"Alone?"

"Alone."

"Eight years."

"Eight years."

"You didn't call me once."

Colleen's face crumpled.

"No," she said. "I didn't."

I looked at my daughter.

"You know what's funny?" I said. "I used to imagine it. When I was in foster care. I used to imagine where you were. I used to imagine you in a house with a garden and a big tree in the backyard. And I used to imagine you sitting under it and thinking about me."

Colleen was crying.

"I was thinking about you," she said.

"You were thinking about me and you didn't call."

"I was scared, Ella."

"Of what?"

"Of him."

The room was quiet.

And then the phone rang.

Not the flip phone. Kael's phone. He picked it up.

"Rook." A pause. "Talk."

Then his face changed.

He walked to the window. Pulled back the curtain.

"Say that again," he said.

Rook said it again.

Kael turned around.

"Ella," he said. "Get Lily. Now."

I stood up.

"What?"

"Get Lily."

"What's happening?"

Kael didn't answer me. He was already at the door.

And then I heard it.

Not a knock. Not a gunshot. Something else.

A car engine. Idling at the gate. Two of them.

Then a voice through a speaker.

"Open the gate or I'll open it myself."

Kael turned to me.

"Ella," he said. "Go upstairs."

I looked down at my daughter.

"Come here, baby," I said.

And then I heard it again. The voice through the speaker. Different this time. Softer. Almost friendly.

"Ella Rae. It's your father. Please open the gate."

Chapter 15 Ends.