Chapter 2 - The Table Nobody Used
Cormac drew his pistol before the rear door opened.
June grabbed his wrist.
“No shooting in my kitchen.”
He looked at her as though this was an unusual priority.
The handle turned again.
“June?” the voice called.
She knew it now.
Eddie Vale.
Ray’s oldest friend.
Eddie had delivered beer to Holloway House for seventeen years. He had carried Ray’s coffin. He had stood beside June at the cemetery with tears on his cheeks.
Cormac positioned himself beside the doorway.
June unlocked it.
Eddie stepped inside.
He saw Cormac.
Then the gun.
His face drained.
“Oh, hell.”
Cormac closed the door.
“Good morning, Eddie.”
Eddie backed into a stack of produce crates.
June crossed her arms.
“You said Ray gave you instructions.”
Eddie looked at her.
Then Cormac.
“Not with him here.”
Cormac raised the pistol slightly.
Eddie reconsidered.
“Okay. With him here.”
He reached slowly into his jacket and removed an envelope.
Ray’s handwriting was on the front.
JUNE.
Her knees weakened.
She recognized every slant.
Every letter.
Cormac took the envelope first, checked it, then handed it to her.
June tore it open.
Inside was a diner receipt.
Nothing else.
She stared.
The receipt was six years old.
Table twelve.
Two coffees.
One slice of apple pie.
Paid cash.
On the back, Ray had written:
COUNT THE EMPTY CHAIRS.
June looked toward the dining room.
“What does that mean?” Cormac asked.
She already knew.
Table twelve had been removed five years earlier when they renovated.
But Ray had never thrown it away.
It was in the basement.
They went downstairs.
Cormac’s men joined them while Eddie remained under watch in the kitchen.
The basement smelled of detergent, old cardboard, and fryer oil.
Table twelve leaned against a wall.
June counted its four chairs.
Three were ordinary.
The fourth felt heavier.
Cormac turned it over.
A metal compartment had been screwed beneath the seat.
Inside was a flash drive.
June stared at it.
“My husband hid that under a chair?”
Cormac’s expression was grim.
“Your husband was afraid.”
They took it upstairs.
Cormac refused to insert it into June’s office computer.
One of his men brought a clean laptop.
The drive contained one folder.
HOLLOWAY.
Inside were photographs.
Hundreds.
Men entering restaurants.
Trucks unloading crates.
Bank records.
License plates.
Politicians shaking hands with businessmen.
Police officers.
Union representatives.
And Cormac.
June clicked through them.
“What was Ray doing?”
Cormac stood behind her.
“Building insurance.”
“Against you?”
“Against everyone.”
Then June found a photograph of herself.
She stopped.
It showed her leaving the diner.
Another showed her grocery shopping.
Another showed her entering St. Matthew’s Hospital two years earlier.
Someone had been following her.
June’s stomach turned.
Cormac became very still.
“These weren’t taken by Ray.”
“How do you know?”
“The angle. Dates. He was with me on two of these days.”
June turned toward him.
“You met with my husband?”
“Yes.”
“How often?”
Cormac did not answer quickly enough.
“How often?”
“Every month.”
The betrayal hurt more than she expected.
Ray had shared a secret life with this man while June packed his lunches.
“What did he do for you?”
“He kept books.”
“You said he stole from you.”
“I said he participated.”
Cormac pulled another chair over.
“Ray came to me three years ago. He said someone inside my organization was stealing and using legitimate businesses to wash the money. He wanted protection.”
“Why?”
“For you.”
June laughed bitterly.
“Ray lied to me for years for my protection?”
“He was afraid you’d become leverage.”
“I became leverage anyway.”
Cormac had no answer.
They continued searching.
A spreadsheet appeared.
The missing $2.4 million had been divided into dozens of transfers.
But the destination wasn’t Ray’s account.
It was a charitable trust.
HOLLOWAY COMMUNITY FOOD FUND.
June stared.
“That’s impossible.”
She had founded the fund herself after her mother died.
It paid grocery bills for families in the neighborhood.
She checked the balance.
Almost all the money was still there.
Cormac leaned closer.
“Ray didn’t steal the money for himself.”
“Then why put it there?”
“To hide it.”
“From whom?”
A new file appeared.
A video.
Ray sat in the diner after closing.
He looked exhausted.
Older than June remembered.
He stared into the camera.
“If June is watching this, then I failed.”
June stopped breathing.
Ray continued.
“I’m sorry, Junebug.”
Her hand covered her mouth.
Only Ray called her that.
Cormac looked away, giving her the smallest amount of privacy possible.
Ray spoke about a man named Declan Shaw.
Cormac’s chief financial lieutenant.
A man Ray believed had been diverting money, bribing officials, and planning to take control of Cormac’s organization.
Ray had discovered it.
Declan discovered that Ray knew.
So Ray moved the stolen money somewhere Declan couldn’t easily reclaim it.
Into June’s charity.
“He’ll come for it,” Ray said on the recording. “But the money isn’t the important part. The records are.”
Ray leaned toward the camera.
“June, if Cormac is with you, ask him about Evelyn.”
Cormac went rigid.
June paused the video.
“Who’s Evelyn?”
“No one.”
Ray’s recorded face remained frozen on the screen.
“Apparently she’s someone.”
Cormac’s jaw tightened.
“Continue.”
June did.
Ray’s voice became softer.
“Cormac, if you’re hearing this, you owe me. Not money. You know what I did for Evelyn. Protect June. Even if she hates you for it.”
The video ended.
June turned.
Cormac was staring at the blank screen.
“Who was Evelyn?”
“My wife.”
June hadn’t known he had been married.
“What happened?”
“She died.”
Something about the way he said it stopped further questions.
For now.
Cormac stood.
“We need to move you.”
“No.”
“Someone shot at you.”
“And somebody has to open the diner.”
He stared at her.
“My window is broken. My employees will arrive in twenty minutes. Half the neighborhood will be standing outside asking what happened by seven. If I disappear, whoever is watching knows I found something.”
Cormac considered this.
June pointed toward the dining room.
“So we open.”
“You’re impossible.”
“So I’ve been told.”
By seven-fifteen, plywood covered the broken window.
By seven-thirty, coffee was flowing.
Cormac sat in booth six, looking absurdly expensive among construction workers and retirees.
June refused to close.
It became the busiest breakfast she had served in months.
Everyone had heard about the shooting.
Nobody believed her story about vandalism.
At nine-forty, June carried Cormac coffee.
“You’re frightening my customers.”
“They’re eating.”
“They’re eating quickly.”
Cormac took the mug.
“Efficient.”
June rolled her eyes.
His mouth twitched.
Then the bell above the front door rang.
A man entered.
Tall.
Silver-haired.
Expensive navy coat.
Cormac stopped smiling.
Every man connected to him became alert.
The stranger looked around.
Then directly at June.
“Mrs. Holloway.”
June set down the coffee pot.
“Do I know you?”
“No.”
He smiled.
“But your husband knew me.”
Cormac stood.
“Declan.”
June’s blood chilled.
Declan Shaw ignored him.
He slid into the booth opposite June.
Then he placed something on the table.
Ray’s wedding ring.
June stared at it.
She had buried Ray wearing that ring.
Declan smiled.
“I think it’s time someone told you what really happened to your husband.”
May you like
Then he opened his hand.
There was fresh dirt beneath the gold band.
