Chapter 5
The office door had been closed for seven months.
I inserted the key and turned it. The lock clicked.
I pushed the door open.
The smell hit me first. Grant's cologne. Old paper. Coffee.
It was like he had just stepped out for a minute. Like he would walk back in any second, smile at me, and ask what was for dinner.
My throat tightened.
Lena stood behind me in the doorway, not entering.
"You can come in," I said.
She stepped inside slowly, looking around.
The office was exactly as Grant left it. His desk covered in papers. His leather chair pushed back slightly. A framed photo of Poppy on his desk—her grinning, missing her two front teeth.
I walked to the desk and ran my hand over the wood.
Dust.
Everything was covered in a thin layer of dust.
"So," Lena said softly. "Where do we start?"
I looked at the piles of paper on his desk. The filing cabinet in the corner. The bookshelf behind his chair.
"Thirty minutes," I said. "Let's make it fast."
We started with the desk. I went through the drawers one by one. Pens. Paper clips. Old receipts. A half-eaten pack of gum.
No will.
Lena sorted through the papers on top of the desk. Bills. Bank statements. Work documents.
"Nothing here," she said.
We moved to the filing cabinet. I pulled open the top drawer. Taxes. Insurance policies. The old will—the one that left everything to me and Poppy.
I held it up.
"This is the one from the funeral," I said. "The one Margaret says is outdated."
Lena looked at it, then looked away.
"Keep going," she said.
The second drawer. More work files. Old contracts. Nothing personal.
The third drawer. At the bottom, under a stack of old folders, I found something.
A small locked box.
Metal. Heavy. About the size of a shoebox.
My heart began to pound.
"Lena," I said.
She came over and looked down at it.
"What is that?"
"I don't know," I said. "I've never seen it before."
I tried to open it. Locked.
"Do you have a key?" Lena asked.
I shook my head. "Grant never mentioned this. Never."
I looked around the office. Where would he hide a key?
His desk drawer. The filing cabinet. The bookshelf.
I stood up and walked to the bookshelf. My eyes scanned the spines. Grant loved old books. First editions.
One book stood out. It was slightly out of place. Pushed forward more than the others.
May you like
I pulled it out.
Taped to the back cover was a small key.
