Chapter 9: Tea With the Old Man

Bram locked the door behind the last of Corvin's men and stood with his back to it.

He turned the lock and tested it twice.

"Who is he to you?"

"A stranger."

"He looked at your hands," Bram said. His eyes were hard. "Tell me the truth."

"He's a man I'd rather not meet again."

"Then you won't," said Bram.

He said it flatly, and it was the only thing all night that made me feel safe.

The next morning, a black car stopped outside the laundromat.

The driver handed Pru a cream envelope, and Pru handed it to me in her pajamas, with her mouth open.

"It's from the old man," she whispered. "The grandfather. It says tea. It says noon. Calla, he's going to murder you."

"I'm going."

"Why?"

"Because I want to see what he has."

I texted Bram before I left, because I had agreed to.

He called at once. I let it ring, and then I sent: *Tea with your grandfather. I'll be fine.*

His reply came in under a minute: *I'm coming.*

*No,* I typed. *He wants me alone. Let him think he has me.*

There was a long gap.

*One hour,* Bram wrote. *Then I come in with the door off its hinges.*

The conservatory at the back of the house was glass on three sides, full of white orchids.

The old man sat in his wheelchair at a small iron table with a teapot and two cups.

Nobody else was in sight.

"Miss Salisbury. Sit."

I sat.

"Milk?"

"No, thank you."

He poured for himself, slowly, with a hand that shook very little.

"You are a clever girl," he said. "You stood in my dining room and lied beautifully. A tune, you said. A mother, perhaps."

"It was true."

"It was convenient." He slid a long envelope across the table.

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