Chapter 18 - Cormac’s Offer
Cormac Kavanaugh wanted a trade.
The cedar chest for the hard drive.
No police. No prosecutors. No federal agents. No Renick’s private army.
Just Renick, Belle, and the boy.
Belle laughed in his face through the phone.
“No.”
Cormac went quiet.
Renick looked at her, startled.
Belle took the phone from him.
“You don’t get my son. You don’t get to say boy like he’s a thing you can request. You don’t get to drag my dead mother into this and expect me to walk politely into your trap.”
Cormac’s voice cooled. “Mrs. Ashford, your mother understood sacrifice.”
“My mother understood monsters. That’s why she hid things from you.”
A pause.
Then Cormac chuckled. “You have her mouth.”
“And you have ten seconds before I hang up.”
Renick’s eyes flickered.
Belle held up a hand. She was done being managed.
Cormac said, “Very well. Come to the old ferry terminal by midnight, or I burn the chest.”
Belle’s chest tightened.
“The hard drive,” Cormac continued. “And the boy.”
“No.”
“The boy opens what the drive cannot.”
Belle looked at Micah.
He stood beside Brinley near the laundry room door, both children pale and silent.
“What does that mean?” Belle asked.
Cormac’s voice softened. “Ask him what he remembers from Saint Oran’s.”
Belle froze.
Micah frowned.
Cormac hung up.
The room went cold.
Belle looked at her son.
“Micah?”
He shook his head immediately. “I don’t know.”
But he was scared.
Not confused.
Scared.
Belle knelt. “Baby.”
“I don’t know,” he repeated.
Brinley touched his sleeve. “Bird boy saw bells.”
Micah’s face crumpled.
Belle’s stomach dropped.
“What bells?”
Micah looked at the floor. “When I was little. At your work. The bird sounds stopped and bells played.”
Belle remembered.
The night shift at Saint Oran’s. Micah asleep in the staff room. Belle mopping the south corridor. A fire alarm? No. Not an alarm. Music. Soft bells over the speakers. She had thought it was some therapy recording.
“What happened when the bells played?” Belle asked.
Micah’s eyes filled.
“A lady came in. Grandma Nora was with her. They were carrying a baby.”
Renick took one step forward.
Belle’s breath stopped. “What baby?”
Micah pointed at Brinley.
The room went silent.
Renick looked like the floor had vanished beneath him.
Belle whispered, “You remember Brinley?”
Micah nodded, crying now. “I didn’t know it was her. I was four.”
Renick crouched in front of him, face pale.
“Micah, did my wife come with the baby?”
Micah shook his head. “Not your wife.”
Renick froze.
“Who?”
Micah wiped his face. “My grandma said, ‘Don’t let them take this one too.’ And the lady with her said, ‘Aisling is dead if we fail.’”
Belle looked at Ortiz.
Ortiz looked stunned.
Renick stood slowly.
“Aisling was alive after the explosion,” he whispered.
No one spoke.
His wife had not died on Atlantic Avenue.
At least not then.
Belle felt horror unfold piece by piece.
“What happened to her?” she asked.
Renick’s face hardened around pain.
Cormac had the answer.
Of course he did.
Ortiz stepped forward. “We do not trade children.”
“No,” Belle said. “We don’t.”
Renick turned to her.
Belle looked at him, and for the first time, they were not maid and employer, poor woman and dangerous man, outsider and king.
They were two parents standing over a pit.
“You said Ortiz can verify the drive,” Belle said.
Ortiz nodded. “If the key is what I think it is, yes.”
“Then we copy it.”
Renick’s eyes sharpened.
Belle continued, “Give Cormac something that looks like what he wants. Keep the real one safe. And my son does not go.”
Cormac wanted Bird.
But maybe Bird didn’t have to be Micah.
May you like
Belle looked at the paper crane Micah had made for Rosa, now crushed slightly in his backpack pocket.
“What if,” she said slowly, “we send him a bird?”
