Chapter 4 - The Recovery of the Ward
By the middle of November, Chloe was back in the house behind the stone gates on Delaware Avenue.
The ventilator was gone, replaced by a slight, pale thinness around her cheeks and a new, quiet hostility that sat between her and her father like an iron sheet. She spent her days in the library on the second floor, her fingers tracing the old leather spines of her mother’s books, her black nail polish completely chipped away to reveal raw, bitten skin beneath.
Gabriel sat across from her at the long mahogany dining table on a Tuesday evening, a plate of untouched chicken and asparagus between them.
“You’re going to a school in Vermont after the new year, Chloe,” Gabriel said, his voice level as he cut his meat with a slow, mechanical precision. “A private place near the lake. No city, no friends from Sixth Street. No more amber bottles.”
Chloe didn't look up from her plate. She used her fork to trace a circle in the gravy, her dark brown hair falling forward to hide her face. “You can send me to Vermont, Dad. You can send me to Switzerland if you want. But the pills are still going to be there. They just cost more in the mountains.”
Gabriel set his knife down with a sharp clink that made the crystal glasses on the sideboard vibrate. “I killed the man who sold them to you, Chloe. Personally. He’s sitting under four feet of gravel near the lime pits on the North Side. If you want another bottle, you’re going to have to dig him up yourself.”
Chloe finally lifted her eyes. They were her mother’s eyes—a pale, watery blue that always looked like they were on the verge of a tear or a fire. “You think that solves it? You think because you chop the hands off the guys on the corner, I stop wanting to go to sleep? I didn't take them because of the dealers, Dad. I took them because every time I walk down the stairs in this house, I feel like I’m visiting a museum dedicated to a guy who isn't even dead yet.”
She stood up, her chair scraping loudly against the polished oak floor, and walked out of the room before Gabriel could find the words to stop her.
He sat in the empty dining room for an hour, the chicken turning white and cold in the gravy, the grandfather clock in the hall ticking out its slow, heavy rhythm into the dark corners of the house.
He reached into his jacket, pulled out his phone, and dialed Rocco’s number.
“Rocco,” Gabriel said when the line connected.
“Yeah, boss?”
“The girl from the diner. Sadie Vance. Is she still working the third shift?”
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“Yeah,” Rocco said, the sound of papers rustling over the static. “She’s still there. The hand healed up fine, Gabe. We checked. Why?”
“Tell the owner of the Redbird Diner that his lease just went up by four thousand dollars a month,” Gabriel said, his eyes fixed on the empty chair at the end of the table. “And tell him the only way he gets his old rate back is if he fires her by Friday morning.”
