Chapter 5: Take the Money

Beau went back to the bar, whistling.

I waited until I couldn't see his loafers anymore.

Then I put the envelope in Eleanor's hand.

"I'm not keeping that," I said. "I'm not hiding it either. Count it, and tell me what you want done."

"Sam."

"You told me to take it with your knee."

"I did." Her shoulders came down. "I wanted him to think he could buy you. A man who believes that stops trying anything worse."

"What's worse?"

"I don't know yet."

She counted the bills under the table, twice, with her thumb.

"Two thousand," she said. "Exactly. He didn't even round up."

"What do I do with it?"

"Keep it somewhere safe. Write down the date and the time." She slid the envelope into my backpack. "If he gives you more, take that too."

"I'm not a spy for you either."

"No." Her green eyes met mine. "You're my tutor. But I am about to ask you for something that has nothing to do with my grades."

We paid the check, and I won the fight over my half.

She drove us home with both hands on the wheel, past Monument Avenue's statues and under the old trees, and she did not say a word.

At her house she turned off the engine and sat looking at the dark windows.

"Come inside," she said.

"Eleanor."

"I'm not asking you to my bed. I'm asking you to the study."

Her house was quiet.

She walked me down the hall past the portrait and stopped at the oak door.

Her hand shook as she took the brass key out of her cardigan pocket.

"I haven't opened this since the funeral," she said.

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