Chapters (54)
- Cover
- Epigraph
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Epilogue
- A Note from the Author
- Discussion Questions
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Acclaim for David Rawlings
- Also by David Rawlings
Arnold’s smile broadened. “Are you suggesting we aren’t thorough? A pharmaceutical company?”
Kelly bit her tongue before it gave her more cause for regret, but her silence answered for her.
“I see,” Arnold said, sneering. “I’d love to fire you right here and now and march you from the premises myself, but Human Resources told me you need three warnings.” He leaned forward on his elbows, which slipped on the edge of the desk, deflating his attempt at intimidation. “So consider this your first official warning.”
Kelly stood. She had breathing room and time to work out how she would manage paying the price demanded of her.
Twenty-Three
Daniel’s mouth flapped open like a goldfish on a sidewalk. Simon reached under the counter and pulled out a thick book with a black-and-white-checkered cover. He dropped it on the counter with a thud and thumbed through the dog-eared pages, his finger tracing line after line of transactions written in a block-like hand.
Simon knew Gramps?
“Now let’s see . . . His was the Olympus HS-10 Infinity . . .” His finger stopped halfway down the page. “Here we are. Gordon Sumner. W.I.N. five dollars. Wow, that’s coming up to ten years ago.” Simon looked up at Daniel and smiled as he shook his head. “He took that long . . .”
Daniel’s brain sputtered like the engine of an abandoned Chevy buried in a shed of junk. “How . . . What . . .”
Simon looked over Daniel’s shoulder, a wistfulness dancing in his eyes. “It was a spring day, one of those days that make you want to quit your job and go on a perpetual picnic. You know the ones.”
Whir, whir, whir. His thoughts still refused to turn over. “Let me see that.” He reached for the order book, but Simon swept it from the countertop.
“Gordon came in here a broken man. A pocket full of betting slips and eyes full of tears. He had only five dollars to his name.”
Daniel’s brain crawled out of the fog. “So he spent his last five dollars on a camera.”
Simon patted the camera as it sat on the counter between them. “It’s worth far more, Daniel, but he paid the price he needed to pay. He paid what was needed.”
The tears sprang free at the memory of his beloved grandfather, spending the last of his money on what sounded like the one thing that saved him. Eventually.
Simon picked up the camera and brushed white-gloved fingers over the inscription with something approaching love. “He got it engraved like he said he would. He even went with the wording we discussed.”
The wording they’d discussed? “But he never mentioned this camera shop before, and he would have at least dropped in to see me at my practice.”