Chapter 9 - The Settlement
Two years later, the old Hale Distribution facility was gone.
In its place stood a low, brick-fronted building with wide windows and a sign that read Whitmore & Hale Logistics Management. The concrete pads where the freezer units had stood had been jackhammered out, the old gravel replaced by six inches of dark, rich topsoil from the Western suburbs.
Clara sat in her new office on the second floor. The windows faced south, toward the city, and the room was warm—always warm, heated by an under-floor water system that kept the temperature at a steady seventy-two degrees year-round.
The door opened, and James walked in carrying two small jackets—one red, one blue.
"The apples are coming in," he said, tossing the jackets onto the small sofa by the door. "The ones we planted where the compressor used to be. The Honeycrisps are small, but they’re sweet."
Clara looked up from her spreadsheet. She was thirty-three now, her face fuller than it had been during the winter of the trial, her eyes bright and clear of the gray shadows that had lived there for years.
"Sarah tried to eat one this morning," Clara said, smiling. "She didn't wait for her grandmother to wash it. She just bit it right off the branch."
"She’s impatient," James said, sitting in the chair opposite her desk. "Like her mother."
"She’s selective," Clara corrected him. "She knows what’s good before she’s told."
A woman named Helen Paulson—Paul’s sister—had called Clara the night before from Michigan. She had asked if she could send a box of Paul’s old books to the girls—things from his childhood, old Latin grammars and geometry sets.
"What did you tell her?" James asked.
"I told her she could send the geometry sets," Clara said. "The logic is fine. The lines are straight. The problem wasn't the geometry, James. The problem was the person who tried to use it to divide a life by zero."
James nodded once, his hand resting on the edge of her desk. His fingers were broad and calloused from the warehouse work he still insisted on doing himself every morning before the office opened. "The U.S. Attorney called this morning. Paul’s appeal was denied by the Seventh Circuit. Geller tried to argue that the forensic logs were obtained without a proper warrant, but the court ruled that since you were a co-owner of the router, you had the right to consent to the search."
Clara didn't look up from her screen. "I didn't consent to the search, James. I requested it. There’s a difference in the compliance codes."
"I know," James said.
He stood up and walked to the window, looking down at the small orchard between the warehouse bays. Two little girls—now two and a half years old—were running through the young trees, their red and blue jackets bright against the green grass. Clara’s mother was sitting on a wooden bench nearby, a knitting bag in her lap.
"They look like they belong here," James said.
May you like
Clara stood up, closed her laptop with a soft click, and walked over to stand beside him. She put her hand over his—the one resting on the window frame. Her palm was warm, her fingers steady.
"They do," she said. "We do."
