Chapter 22: The Last Rail

At six the next morning, the storage unit's roll door went up on the old shop's last things.

The sign for Bolt & Thread leaned against the back wall, with the paint worn off one corner of the B.

Behind it stood two rolls of wide-width velvet, a pair of sewing machines under blankets, and the six-foot work lamp my first client had given me.

Brett backed the truck up to the door, and two of his men climbed down from the cab.

They were the same two men who had walked out of my studio.

They stopped at the edge of the unit and stood with their caps in their hands.

"We came for Mrs. Tolbert," the taller one said. "Not for him."

"That's fair," Brett said.

"He paid us."

"I know he did."

"We'd rather know where you want it," he said to me.

I looked at the room, and I pointed.

"The sign first. Then the velvet. Nothing over fifteen pounds comes near me, and nothing goes on the truck until I say so."

Brett picked up the sign.

It was six feet wide, and he carried it out on one shoulder without a word.

Every time one of the men reached for a box, I called the next thing, and Brett obeyed.

"The lamp."

He lifted it and waited in the doorway with it in both arms.

"Where do you want it, Lorena?"

"You're asking," I said.

"I'm asking."

"By the window," I said. "Where the afternoon light hits the cutting table."

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