Chapter 2 - The House Where Silence Lived
Z
Marin studied the card without touching it.
GIDEON ROURKE was printed in simple black letters. No company name. No address. No telephone number.
“You want me to paint your son’s bedroom?” she asked.
“If he lets you.”
“And if he doesn’t?”
“Then you leave.”
The answer surprised her. Men with Gideon’s reputation were not known for accepting refusal.
“I charge by the hour,” she said.
“Name your price.”
“Twenty-eight dollars an hour, plus materials.”
Freddy, standing near the pharmacy door, looked as if she had announced she intended to rob a bank.
Gideon merely nodded. “Tomorrow morning. Nine o’clock.”
“I didn’t say yes.”
“No. You didn’t.”
He reached into his coat, pulled out a clean handkerchief, and placed it beside her coins.
“Let the pharmacist clean that wound properly. I’ll pay for the supplies, but I won’t ask you to accept money you don’t want.”
Marin hated how reasonable he sounded. It made it harder to dismiss him as the monster everyone described.
“I’ll come tomorrow,” she said finally. “One day. Nothing more.”
“Agreed.”
She pointed at the door. “Now, please stop following me.”
For the first time, something resembling amusement touched his face.
He left without another word.
The pharmacist cleaned Marin’s wrist and wrapped it in gauze. The cut was deeper than she had thought, and the bill consumed nearly half her remaining money.
Outside, a black SUV waited at the curb.
Gideon stood beside it, speaking to a man on his phone. He ended the call when he saw her.
“I told you to stop following me.”
“I’m not following you. I’m making sure you get home.”
“I have a bus pass.”
“And I have a car.”
“That isn’t an argument.”
“No,” he admitted. “It’s an offer.”
She looked at the snow beginning to collect along the sidewalk, then at the bandage around her wrist.
“Just to the bus stop.”
He opened the passenger door.
As she climbed in, she noticed a child's drawing tucked into the dashboard: a crooked house, three stick figures, and a yellow sun.
Gideon caught her looking.
“Noah drew that before he stopped speaking,” he said.
Marin looked at the picture again.
“Then perhaps he hasn’t forgotten how to tell people things.”
Gideon said nothing.
May you like
But when the SUV pulled away, his hands tightened around the steering wheel.
For a man who controlled half the Providence waterfront, he looked suddenly helpless.
