Chapter 3 - The Abandoned Antiques Shop and Mrs. Whitaker’s Silence
The rain began to drum harder against the corrugated tin roof of the antiques shop across the street.
Mrs.
June Whitaker sat behind her cluttered wooden counter downstairs,
surrounded by dusty porcelain dolls,
rusted oil lamps,
and yellowed paperbacks.
She hadn’t asked any questions when I rented the attic room four weeks ago,
handing over crisp hundred-dollar bills from my secret emergency stash.
Now,
looking out the grime-streaked window of my cramped room,
I wondered if Mrs.
Whitaker had already sold me out to the highest bidder.
In a town where everyone knew everyone’s business,
an out-of-towner with no luggage except a canvas bag was bound to attract dangerous attention.
Especially when men in black SUVs started asking quiet questions at the local diner about a young woman with paint-stained fingers.
I paced the creaking wooden floorboards,
my hand resting protectively over my stomach as the wind howled through the loose window panes.
“You’re safe here,
” I whispered to the empty room,
trying to convince myself more than the growing child inside me.
“Gavin knows where I am.
Which means Declan knows.
And if Declan knows,
it’s only a matter of hours before he’s standing at the bottom of these narrow stairs.
” The thought of seeing those dark,
stormy eyes again filled me with a sickening mixture of raw terror and aching longing.
For months,
Declan Voss had been my entire world,
the anchor in a life that had otherwise been defined by orphanhood and solitude.
He was the monster the city whispered about in locked-door boardrooms,
but to me,
he was the man who noticed the way morning light hit my paintbrushes.
He knew my favorite teas,
the exact degree of warmth I needed when my migraines flared up,
and the quiet sorrow I carried from losing my parents years ago.
He had promised me absolute protection from the violent underbelly of Chicago.
He had sworn on his mother’s grave that nothing would ever touch me inside his walls.
The rain began to drum harder against the corrugated tin roof of the antiques shop across the street.
Mrs.
June Whitaker sat behind her cluttered wooden counter downstairs,
surrounded by dusty porcelain dolls,
rusted oil lamps,
and yellowed paperbacks.
She hadn’t asked any questions when I rented the attic room four weeks ago,
handing over crisp hundred-dollar bills from my secret emergency stash.
Now,
looking out the grime-streaked window of my cramped room,
I wondered if Mrs.
Whitaker had already sold me out to the highest bidder.
In a town where everyone knew everyone’s business,
an out-of-towner with no luggage except a canvas bag was bound to attract dangerous attention.
Especially when men in black SUVs started asking quiet questions at the local diner about a young woman with paint-stained fingers.
I paced the creaking wooden floorboards,
my hand resting protectively over my stomach as the wind howled through the loose window panes.
“You’re safe here,
” I whispered to the empty room,
trying to convince myself more than the growing child inside me.
“Gavin knows where I am.
Which means Declan knows.
And if Declan knows,
it’s only a matter of hours before he’s standing at the bottom of these narrow stairs.
” The thought of seeing those dark,
stormy eyes again filled me with a sickening mixture of raw terror and aching longing.
For months,
Declan Voss had been my entire world,
the anchor in a life that had otherwise been defined by orphanhood and solitude.
He was the monster the city whispered about in locked-door boardrooms,
but to me,
he was the man who noticed the way morning light hit my paintbrushes.
He knew my favorite teas,
the exact degree of warmth I needed when my migraines flared up,
and the quiet sorrow I carried from losing my parents years ago.
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He had promised me absolute protection from the violent underbelly of Chicago.
He had sworn on his mother’s grave that nothing would ever touch me inside his walls.
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