I Thought Love Had to Be Earned Through Chores, They Hugged Me novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: Gutters

My father flew to Denver at six the next morning.

A truck yard there was on strike, and it couldn't wait.

He came to the storage room door in his coat before he left.

I was already up. I'd been up since four.

"Back Thursday," he said. "The gate man has your picture. Nobody gets in. Okay?"

"Okay."

He stood there.

Then his phone buzzed and he went.

At breakfast Odette had a theory.

She'd been up all night thinking about it, she said. Her eyes were pink to prove it.

"What if it was the investigators?" She turned her coffee cup in little circles. "What if one of them was working for that woman? Selling her the dates?"

Wesley didn't look up from his eggs.

"I used four different agencies. Over seven years. They didn't know each other."

"Oh." She bit her lip. "Then I don't know."

She went quiet for a while.

Then she said, very gently, like she hated to say it, "Minnie told Dad she called Noreen. From the hotel. Before the banquet."

My mother's fork stopped.

"She said it's a rule," Odette went on softly. "She reports her address. Every time she moves." She looked at me with big wet eyes. "Minnie, I'm not blaming you. You were little. But what if you've always told her? What if that's how she always knew?"

"I only call when I move," I said. "Not when people are coming. I didn't know when people were coming."

"But she knew Friday," Odette said. "That woman at the brunch said Noreen already knew."

Wesley put his fork down.

I watched it land in his face.

"Give me your phone," he said.

I gave it to him. It was a prepaid flip phone with a crack across the front.

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