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May as well be useful too.
He shrugged. “Hell if I know,” he slurred. “Never knew the combination.”
I frowned, then turned to the secured metal box, looking at the dial.
Iknew the combination, assuming it was the same one my mother had told me on countless occasions when I was here with her in this office.
There was nothinglessenticing to me than opening that safe in front of him though, in case therewasanything useful in it.
For now, I turned away from it, going to her desk.
His eyes never left me.
I kept ignoring him though, taking the framed photos from her desktop, and a few knickknacks here and there from her drawers. Relief hit me when the doorbell rang, but I was careful not to have any reaction to it other than looking at him when it rang again and he still hadn’t moved from the threshold.
“Are you expecting someone?” I asked. “Do you want me to get that for you?”
Instead of answering, he just grunted something unintelligible before he moved on, presumably to get the door. Knowing I didn’t have much time, I waited until I heard him descending the steps before I raced back to the safe, hurriedly dialing in the right combination.
My heart leapt into my throat when it opened.
No precious jewels, of course, but it did have her laptop and a few other electronics. There were a few file folders, which I took as well, and a key I recognized as one that unlocked the hidden drawer in her desk.
I took that too, burying everything except the key underneath the things already in my box before I closed the safe again, spun it back to the number it was on before I touched it, then went back to the desk.
I knew exactly where that hidden drawer was.
My hands were shaking as I went through the steps to access the keyhole, this wholesecret for just us girlsI’d had with my mother. Back then—when I was a child—there were letters in it that she would never let me see.
Those same letters were there now.
I didn’t even bother looking at them, just snatched them up, putting everything back as it was just as I heard my father’s footsteps drawing near again.
By the time he was back in the doorway, I had a stack of files on the desk, perusing through them as if they held anything of interest.
I knew they didn’t, but it was perfect cover.
Still, my father was suspicious ofsomething.
I could feel it with the way he was staring.
I switched to a new file box, ignoring him as best as I could, expecting it to be yet another one full of old reports from the store.
It wasn’t.
It was… birth records.
Both official and non-official, cutesy milestone charts, things like that.
I tried not to have a reaction to those either. Just closed the box and put it with the things I wanted to take, but my father must’ve picked up on something in my expression. He practically sprinted across the room to take it.
“What is this?!” he demanded, shaking the box in front of me.
“Baby stuff,” I answered. “Stuff you probably don’t care about,” I countered, taking it from him.
With effort.
He didn’t want to let it go.
