The Day a Baker’s Daughter Spoke a Dead Man’s Name in the Rain

“I heard the recording before I left. Give me the drive.”

He looked at her with helpless anger. “You should not be part of this.”

“I became part of it when a stranger called our business and knew Mara had been here.”

“That’s why you should stay away.”

“That isn’t how marriage works.”

Mara looked down.

Caleb saw it and immediately looked ashamed.

Hannah crossed to the bench. “My sister has a safe at the veterinary clinic. Nobody knows I have the combination except her.”

Rocco said, “What kind of safe?”

Hannah gave him a flat look. “The kind that is not in this room.”

He nodded.

Caleb handed her the drive.

As she put it into her coat pocket, someone knocked at the front door.

All five of them froze.

A man’s silhouette stood beyond the blinds.

“Caleb Mercer?” the man called. “Delivery.”

Caleb had not ordered anything.

Rocco switched off the bench light. He rolled beside the doorway and removed something from beneath his chair cushion.

A folding knife.

Mara stared.

He opened it with one hand.

The knock came again.

Hannah took out her phone.

The man outside said, “Package for Mercer Pipe Restoration.”

Caleb whispered, “That isn’t our name.”

Rocco pointed toward the rear exit.

Hannah moved first. Caleb followed, carrying the cassette. Mara pushed the rear door open and checked the alley.

Empty.

Rocco backed his wheelchair toward the exit. The front door handle rattled.

Then the glass shattered.

Mara ducked as something struck the workshop floor.

Smoke erupted.

Not fire. A chemical cloud that burned her eyes and throat.

Rocco shouted, “Out!”

Caleb stumbled into the alley coughing. Hannah pulled him toward the van. Mara grabbed the handles of Rocco’s chair before he could object and dragged him backward over the threshold. One wheel caught. He struck the doorframe with his shoulder.

The man entered through the broken glass wearing a respirator.

Rocco twisted in the chair and threw the knife.

The blade struck the wall beside the man’s head.

The hesitation was enough.

Mara yanked the chair free. Rocco seized the rear door and slammed it shut as the intruder reached them. His gloved fingers appeared around the edge. Rocco drove the metal rim of his wheel into the hand.

The man shouted and released it.

Caleb shoved a steel pipe through the door handles.

They ran—or rolled—toward the van.

Hannah stopped. “The drive.”

Her coat pocket had torn. The red flash drive was gone.

Caleb turned back.

Rocco caught his sleeve. “No.”

“It’s in there.”

“So is he.”

“The tape—”

“You have the cassette.”

Caleb held up the cloudy plastic case.

The rear door buckled once under an impact.

Mara lowered the ramp. “Move.”

Rocco pulled himself up while Caleb and Hannah climbed inside. Mara had barely folded the board when the rear door burst open behind them.

The masked man stepped into the alley.

Mara drove before anyone was secured.

Rocco’s wheelchair rolled backward. He caught the cargo rail with one arm. Caleb slammed against the side panel. Hannah dropped to the floor and grabbed the chair frame.

“Left!” Rocco shouted.

Mara turned left.

A black sedan shot from the opposite end of the alley.

For one second, both vehicles faced each other.

Then the sedan accelerated.

Mara’s foot hovered over the brake.

“Don’t stop,” Rocco said.

She pressed the gas.

The sedan swerved first, clipping a dumpster. Sparks jumped beneath its front wheel. Mara’s van scraped along the brick wall, tearing off the passenger mirror, but it made the street.

The sedan did not follow.

Mara drove six blocks before pulling behind a grocery store.

Everyone breathed.

Hannah began laughing.

Caleb stared at her.

“I’m sorry,” she said, still laughing. “I lost the drive.”

“You almost lost your hand.”

“I liked the drive less.”

Mara gripped the steering wheel until the trembling passed through her arms.

Rocco checked the chair frame, then his shoulder. Blood darkened the torn edge of his shirt where he had struck the door.

“You need a hospital,” Mara said.

“No.”

“You’re bleeding.”

“I have blood. It does that.”

Caleb held the cassette in both hands. “He wanted this.”

“He wanted all of us frightened enough to destroy it,” Rocco said.

“That worked,” Caleb replied.

Hannah stopped laughing. “We are not going home.”

“No,” Rocco said. “You’re going somewhere Adrian Vale wouldn’t connect to you.”

“My sister.”

“He may know her.”

“He doesn’t.”

“You don’t know what he knows.”

Caleb snapped, “Not everyone has spent twenty years expecting murder.”

The van went silent.

Rocco looked at him.

Caleb’s anger faded, replaced by embarrassment and something more honest. Fear. “I’m sorry.”

“No,” Rocco said. “You aren’t wrong.”

Mara turned in her seat. “Why did you come to Cedar Hollow now?”

He looked toward the blank space where the passenger mirror had been.

“Rocco.”

“Nine months ago, I found a payment from Castellano Development to a freight company in Ohio. The company existed for six weeks. Its only employee was the driver who hit me.”

Hannah whispered, “You have proof?”

“I had an invoice and a bank transfer.”

“Had?”

“My apartment burned while I was in rehabilitation.”

Caleb stared at the wheelchair. “The truck put you in the chair?”

“Yes.”

“And then your home burned?”

“Yes.”

“You still came here.”

Rocco looked at Mara. “Ray’s last prison letter mentioned Hale’s bakery. I didn’t know why. Last month, somebody mailed me a photograph of your father locking the back door.”

“Who?”

“No return address.”

“You brought it?”

“It was taken from me at the shelter two nights ago.”

“The man with the gray beard?”

“No. Someone searched my bag while I showered.”

Mara’s anger returned, but not at him. “So you sat outside Celeste’s salon.”

“I was watching the bakery.”

“You could have walked in.”

“I don’t walk.”

“You know what I mean.”