Page 80 of The Woman with the Handcuffs

“Why aren’t you opening it?” I asked after he unlocked the door and slid the lock into his pocket.

“Because you haven’t taken a breath since we’ve been standing here. I think this is a bad idea. We should head out for today. Let you get your head around all of this.”

I took an exaggeratedly deep breath.

“There. Just open it.”

“Caitlin…”

“Please. I just need to know.”

Gav’s face was tight. He didn’t like it. But he turned and pulled up the door.

I wasn’t sure what I expected to find. But neatly arranged boxes on metal racks wasn’t on my list.

“Hm.”

“What?” I asked.

“He has lanterns,” Gav said.

“Is that weird? The units don’t have lights.”

“No. But most people just leave the doors open when they’re inside so the hall light shines in. The lantern setup makes me think he was in here with the door closed. I’m thinking maybe we should close the door before we start looking in the boxes.”

I gave him a nod and flicked on the lantern closest to me. Gav did the same with another before closing the door.

I ignored the way my stomach tightened and walked over to the closest box.

“Trading cards?” I asked, grabbing a handful of the cards to show Gav.

“Same here. Just a different kind. Did your dad collect?”

“No. I mean he didn’t even like baseball. Or whatever the hell those are.”

Gav shot me a look before reaching back into the box, but this time digging all the way down to the bottom. When he pulled his hand back out, it wasn’t trading cards he was holding. It was cash. Several stacks of cash.

My heart sank.

“Hey, don’t do that,” Gav said, reading my face.

“My father has stacks and stacks of money hidden in a storage unit. In multiple storage units, it seems. And I’m not supposed to think the worst?”

“Your father made a lot of money working for me. More than it took to buy his house and more than is in his accounts. It’s not unusual to keep cash somewhere like this if you aren’t making it legally. The last fucking thing anyone wants is the tax man breathing down their necks. This lets him have his money somewhere safe. But also accessible. That is probably why he has it in several different states. Because he’s always on the move.”

Okay.

That did make a certain kind of sense.

It didn’t mean all the other stuff wasn’t weird as hell, but it didn’t mean he was doing even more illegal things than we already knew about.

“Okay?” he asked, putting the money back in and hiding it.

“Okay,” I agreed.

“I’ll believe you when I see you actually take a deep breath again,” he said as he approached me.

“Okay,” I agreed, sucking in a breath so deep it burned, then releasing it slowly.