Chapter 9 - The Second KeyDenise Bell met us in a diner outside Newark where the coffee came in chipped mugs and nobody cared about expensive suits.

She was fifty-eight, with silver at her temples and hands rough from years of cleaning offices. She looked at Dad only long enough to tell him she hadn't forgiven him.

"I'm not asking you to," he said.

"Good. Because Curtis begged your managers to stop loading those trucks."

Denise took a small brass key from her pocket and placed it beside the sugar jar.

"Curtis kept records in a locker at a storage unit. He told me there were two keys. I had one. The other belonged to a man he trusted."

"Who?" I asked.

She glanced at Dad. "Samuel Brooks. Your grandfather."

I remembered Grandpa's careful hands, his love of crossword puzzles, and the way he'd gone quiet whenever Dad mentioned the old distribution center.

"He knew?"

"He knew something was wrong. He wanted proof before accusing anybody. Then he got sick."

Denise pushed over an old photograph. Curtis stood beside three warehouse workers in fluorescent vests. Behind them sat pallets stamped with a shipping mark I recognized from Bellwether stores: a blue compass.

"Curtis found invoices for inventory that never existed," Denise said. "The trucks moved at night, but the books said they carried food donations."

Tessa asked, "Do you know what was on those trucks?"

"No. I know my husband was scared. And I know the fire started the night he planned to meet Samuel."

Dad's jaw clenched. "I should have asked more questions."

"Yes," Denise said. "You should have."

I picked up the brass key. "Will you come with us to the storage unit?"

"Only if it's your decision, girl. Not his."

"It's mine."

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Outside, a black SUV idled across the street. When we walked toward our cars, the driver took a photograph through the window and sped away.

Denise looked at me. "That's the same vehicle that followed Curtis before the fire."