The Locked Box

Chapter Two: The Locked Box

The courthouse door clicked shut behind her.

Maya stood on the steps, the cold Birmingham rain soaking through her coat before she even thought to move. She didn't feel it. She didn't feel anything except the hollow ache where her wedding ring used to be.

She looked down at her hand. The pale band of skin was already fading. Soon, there would be no trace of it at all.

Goodbye, she thought. That's really it.

She walked to her car. Got in. Sat there and gripped the steering wheel till her knuckles turned white. She kept staring through the rain-streaked windshield at nothing.

Liam's final words echoed in her head.

If someone ever starts asking questions about your family... don't answer them.

She had wanted to chase after him. Demand an explanation. Shake the truth out of him if she had to.

But she hadn't.

Because she was tired. Tired of fighting. Tired of being lied to. Tired of being made to feel like she was the unreasonable one for wanting honesty.

So she had let him walk away.

Now she sat in the car, alone, wondering if she had just made the biggest mistake of her life.

---

When she finally swerved into the streets, she couldn't remember how she got the turns right. The drive home was a blur. She parked the car, walked through the front door, and stood in the hallway of the house that had once been their home.

It felt different now. Empty. The walls still held photographs of their wedding, their holidays, and their life together. She had meant to take them down, but she hadn't.

She walked to the kitchen. The kettle was still on the gas cooker. She didn't turn it on. She just stood there, staring at the space where he used to stand, making coffee while she read the newspaper at the table.

How did we get here?

The question had no answer. Or too many.

---

She picked up her phone. Called Chloe.

Her friend answered on the second ring. "How did it go?"

"It's done."

A pause. "Maya. Are you okay?"

"I don't know." She leaned against the counter. "He said something. Before he left. Something strange."

"What did he say?"

Maya closed her eyes. "He said that if anyone ever starts asking questions about my family, I shouldn't answer them."

Chloe was quiet for a moment. "What does that mean?"

"I don't know. That's the problem."

"Did you ask him?"

"I tried. He walked away."

Chloe sighed. "Maya, you just divorced the man. Whatever he's mixed up in, it's not your problem anymore. You need to let it go."

Let it go.

Maya felt tired, her bones ached, and her eyes burned from unshed tears. Worse still, her heart ached sorely, she needed an outlet but crying was not an option now.

"He was investigating my family, Chloe. My family. For a year. And I still don't know why."

"You don't need to know why. You just need to move on."

But Maya couldn't shake the feeling that she had missed something. Something important. Something Liam had been trying to tell her without saying the words aloud.

"If someone ever starts asking questions about your family..."

She had inherited her grandfather's keepsakes after her mother's death. Old journals. Photographs. A locked box she had never been able to open.

Liam had been interested in those keepsakes. She hadn't thought much of it at the time.

Now she wondered.

---

She went to the bedroom. Her bedroom now. His things were gone, boxed up and taken away weeks ago. The room felt bigger without him. Colder.

She opened the closet. Reached up to the top shelf where she had stored the box of Henrik's things. It was still there. Dusty. Unopened.

She pulled it down and set it on the bed.

The box was old. Wooden. A small brass lock held it closed. The key had never been found.

This belonged to your grandfather, her mother had said. I don't know what's in it. He never told me. But I think it was important to him.

Maya had tried to open it once. Years ago. She had given up.

Now she looked at it and wondered if Liam had ever found a way inside.

He had been in her things. In the drawer. In the nightstand. What else had he found?

She turned the box over in her hands. The brass lock was old, but not impossible. A locksmith could open it. Or a determined man with a patience she had never known he possessed.

He was protecting you, she reminded herself. That's what he said. He was trying to protect you.

But from what?

She didn't know.

She only knew that the man she had married, the man who had carried her up to bed whenever she fell asleep on the sofa, had turned into someone she didn't recognize. 

And she needed to understand why.

She put the box back on the shelf. Not because she didn't want to know. Because she wasn't ready.

Not yet.

She sat on the edge of the bed, feeling the weight of the day settling on her shoulders. The divorce was final. The marriage was over. She was free.

But freedom, she was learning, came with its own kind of ache.

She thought about Liam's warning. If someone ever starts asking questions about your family...

She thought about her grandfather, Henrik Ellison. A man she had never really known. A man who had died before she could ask him anything.

She thought about her mother. The woman who had carried so many secrets to her grave.

And she thought about the box on the shelf, waiting for someone brave enough to open it.

Maybe Liam had been looking for answers.

Maybe he had found them.

Maybe that was why he had warned her.

Just maybe.

***

She fell asleep that night with the question still circling her mind.

What are you protecting me from, Liam?

And in the dark of her empty bedroom, the answer seemed to come from somewhere far away, somewhere just beyond her reach.

But just before sleep claimed her, a memory surfaced. The first time Liam missed dinner, he had said he was with an old colleague. The subtle changes had started

after that night. Maya realized. Whoever Liam had met that night was connected to this. But a new question settled in her chest.

Who was it?