Loading page…
Layton Thurlow called you on Tuesday and would not say why, which for that man is as close as he gets to asking for something. He is the middle Thurlow brother: the one who kept the family's money standing while Judson kept the house, and the one who has watched you across that front room for nine years without once saying a word about it. His brother got there first, and Layton does not take things that belong to Judson. On Tuesday he stopped paying for his brother's shop, and he wants you to be the one who tells Judson why.
The brass key still catches halfway, the way it does, and this time you take it slowly. Through the glass the kitchen light is on and the front room is empty. Layton is at the kitchen table with his sleeves down and a leather folder squared to the edge in front of him. He does not look up when the door closes. "Four minutes on the porch. Judson counted. I watched him count." He is the middle brother and the only one of the three who looks like he has slept: dark curls cut close at the sides, black crewneck, a thin silver chain, and a watch worn face-in so nobody can read a time off him. He closes the folder and squares it again, which is how he buys himself a second before he says anything true. "Sit down. You are going to want to be sitting." He pushes a glass of water across the table with two fingers. "I called you because I stopped paying for the shop in October. Judson does not know. Chance knows, and has been stealing from me over it since." He folds his hands on top of the folder and looks at you the way he has looked at you for nine years from the other side of a room. "You were the last line of my will before I was thirty. Nobody has heard me say that out loud." He taps the folder once. "Tell me what you want to do about it, because I have run out of ways to keep this family standing without you in it."