Chapter 13: Locked Out

I ran the two blocks in my slippers and my mother's Raiders jacket.

A heavy chain ran through both bay-door handles of Ortega Towing.

The padlock on it was new and as big as my fist.

A notice in a plastic sleeve was zip-tied to the chain.

Rafael stood in the middle of the lot, very still, reading it.

"Month to month," he said, without turning around. "I never signed a real lease. The old owner said we were family."

"Can they do this?"

"They gave thirty days. On paper." He tapped the notice. "Dated last Monday. Mailed to a box I don't have."

I read it over his shoulder.

LANGFORD CAPITAL HOLDINGS. NOTICE OF TERMINATION OF TENANCY.

At the bottom, in blue ink, a signature I'd watched sign seven years of Christmas cards.

Daniel had bought the building the week after a judge gave me Lily.

"The parts," I said. "Rafael. Her hood is in there."

"I know where her hood is."

"And my flatbed. And every tool I own. And my bed, upstairs."

A white SUV pulled up at the curb.

A man in a quarter-zip got out with a clipboard and a locksmith.

"Property management," he said, pleasant as a dentist. "Mr. Ortega? You'll need to vacate the premises."

"My tools are in there."

"Anything inside belongs to the building until the lawyers say otherwise."

The young mechanic stepped forward, and the old one stopped him with one gray hand.

I took out my phone.

The detective answered on the second ring, which told me she didn't sleep either.

"There's evidence in a building Chen Capital bought last week," I said. "And a man here with a clipboard who wants to keep it."

"Don't let anybody open that door," she said. "I'm on my way."

So I stood in front of the bay door.

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