Chapter 9: Floor by the Door

The paper on the shop door was one page, with a county stamp and a signature I did not know.

Southwell Holdings Limited gave Brennan Ink thirty days to vacate the building.

Timothy stood on the sidewalk with his arms crossed, reading it for the third time.

"Thirty-two years," he said. "I opened this shop in ninety-four, and I never once paid late."

"I know, Timothy."

"It's a message to you, isn't it?"

"It's to both of us," Margot said.

She had followed my truck to the shop in her white car.

She stood a careful distance back with her hands in her coat pockets.

Timothy looked her up and down.

"You're the wife."

"For a few more weeks, if he'll let me be."

"You're the one who put a lawyer in my shop."

"I'm the one who's going to buy this building," Margot said.

Timothy blinked.

"With what?"

"With the only thing my father hasn't been able to take from me. My mother's shares."

I turned.

"You have shares?"

"Eleven percent of Southwell Harbor. I can borrow against them tonight."

She looked at Timothy, not at me.

"I can bid on this building by Friday, through a company my father can't trace. His board will take the money. He wants me to beg, and I won't."

"That's a lot of trouble for a tattoo shop."

"It's not for the shop," she said. "It's for the man standing in front of it."

Timothy turned and looked at me for a long moment, and then he laughed.

It was an old man's laugh, thin and worn out.

"Well, hell, Dec. She's better than the last one."

"There was no last one."

"I know. That's what I'm saying."

I rubbed my eyes.

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