Thomas had refused anything improper.
He had done legitimate logistics work, negotiated leases, supervised repairs, and kept records with obsessive precision.
Records.
Connor’s expression hardened.
“What?” Sarah asked.
He remembered an argument from five years earlier.
Thomas had discovered Connor planned to put a small warehouse property in Thomas’s name temporarily while a complicated ownership dispute was settled.
Thomas had refused.
Connor had laughed and called him paranoid.
Thomas had said, If I get hit by a bus tomorrow, Sarah will spend ten years untangling whatever you idiots put on paper.
Connor had eventually used another structure.
At least he believed he had.
“Did anyone contact you after Thomas died about documents?”
“Lots of people contacted me.”
“Anyone from my businesses?”
Sarah thought.
“There was a lawyer.”
Connor’s stomach tightened.
“When?”
“A month after the funeral.
Maybe six weeks.”
“What did he want?”
“He said Thomas had signed something connected to a property transfer, but then he called again and said it had been handled.”
“Name?”
“I don’t remember.”
Connor did.
Or at least he remembered who would know.
He made another call, this one longer.
“No one approaches Sarah.
No one approaches the investigator.
Pull every legitimate property file Thomas touched during the eighteen months before he died.
I want signatures, dates, beneficiaries, everything.”
Sarah stared at him after he hung up.
“What are you thinking?”
“That I should have checked something four years ago.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have yet.”
He heard his own words echo hers from minutes earlier.
Neither of them smiled.
Gracie came back into the kitchen.
“Can I have a banana now?”
Sarah’s face broke in a way Connor had not seen all afternoon.
She laughed.
A real laugh this time.
“Yes, baby.”
Gracie reached for the bunch.
Connor watched her struggle to separate one and helped without saying anything.
She examined the banana carefully.
“This one is green.”
“It’ll survive,” Connor said.
Gracie considered that.
“So will we.”
Connor looked at Sarah.
Sarah looked down quickly.
Two hours later, Connor had an answer.
He returned to the apartment carrying a thin folder.
