Chapter 4 - A Red Door in London
The wet, gray cool of London hit me at the jet bridge and felt like stepping into a different life.
Edmund was waiting past the doors, holding a sign with WHITFIELD written in marker. He'd gone to college with my father a lifetime ago, moved to England in his twenties, and never left.
"Claire. Look at you." He wrapped me in a hug that smelled like pipe tobacco and rain.
"Thank you for coming, Uncle Edmund."
He held me at arm's length and took in the circles under my eyes without saying a word about them. Then he crouched down. "And these two. Mason. Lily. You both look like you could sleep for a week."
Mason stuck out his hand like he'd practiced it. "Nice to meet you, sir."
Edmund shook it, delighted. "The house in Kensington's all ready. Beds made, fridge full. Let's get you home."
Home. He said it so easily.
We pulled up to a narrow townhouse covered in ivy, with a bright red front door. It wasn't half the size of the penthouse. But when I turned the key and stepped inside, it had something the penthouse never managed: it felt like ours.
The kids thundered upstairs to fight over bedrooms. Edmund carried bags into the sitting room and poured tea from a thermos he'd brought.
"Your lawyer called while you were over the water," he said.
"And?"
"It's a rout." He almost smiled. "The IRS is in his offices. The banks have him locked out. Sinclair says they found Preston sitting on the floor of his own hallway like he'd seen a ghost."
I drank my tea and waited for guilt to show up. It didn't. I gave that man ten years, and he tried to put me and his own children on the street. All I did was hand him the bill.
"There's more," Edmund said. "Sinclair's meeting Preston's board tomorrow. He's bringing the embezzlement evidence. He thinks they'll vote him out before lunch, just to save face."
May you like
I looked out at the quiet street, the rain on the glass.
"Let them," I said. "It's not my circus anymore."
