Chapter 9 - The Woman With the Green Ring
The operation was postponed by a day.
A patrol car had been seen near the ferry landing, and Quinn's team wanted to make sure the people inside didn't believe they were about to be raided. I resented the delay, then remembered that Daniel might be killed if someone rushed in carelessly. Impatience was a luxury paid for by the person waiting, not the person in danger.
Meanwhile Meredith Sloan walked into Helena's office with an attorney.
She wore a charcoal suit instead of the red coat Wren remembered, but the green stone ring was still on her right hand. I recognized it before Helena introduced her. A large oval emerald surrounded by tiny diamonds. It looked like an unblinking eye.
Her attorney explained that Meredith wanted to clarify “misleading speculation” about her role. She acknowledged involvement in relocation paperwork but denied knowledge of falsified inspections or the warehouse fire. She claimed Victor made every significant decision and that her administrative accounts were routinely used by other employees.
I sat beside Helena and listened.
“Did you post eviction notices on Mercer Street?” I asked.
Meredith looked at me. “It wasn't eviction. It was emergency relocation.”
“Did you personally hand notices to children?”
“I spoke with residents. Families, yes.”
“Did you know their replacement housing wasn't ready?”
“I relied on vendor reports.”
I recognized the sentence. I'd said versions of it for years.
She glanced at my hand. The compass tattoo was visible against the table. “Victor always said you liked to keep your hands clean.”
“No,” I said. “He said I liked to pretend they were.”
For the first time she looked unsettled.
Helena guided the questions back to specific dates. Meredith conceded she'd seen Daniel Hart's complaints. She said he was “difficult” and insisted on rechecking properties already approved for demolition. She did not deny her office had sent the order to clear Camden Storage the night it burned.
“Who authorized that order?” Helena asked.
Meredith looked at her attorney. They asked for a break.
I stepped into the hall and called Rosa, who was visiting Wren. The girl had asked about school. It hadn't occurred to me that a missing father and a temporary home would also mean missing spelling tests, friends, and ordinary mornings.
“She's worried she'll repeat third grade,” Rosa said.
“We'll arrange tutoring.”
“She doesn't want a private tutor in a mansion. She wants her teacher and friends.”
I closed my eyes. Even my good intentions kept trying to solve ordinary needs with expensive substitutions.
“Ask Ms. Brooks whether she can attend her old school safely,” I said. “And if not, ask what Wren wants before deciding.”
When I returned to the meeting, Meredith looked as though she had been crying. Her attorney said she would answer no more questions without formal agreements with investigators. They left without shaking hands.
I thought that was the end of it until she turned at the elevator.
“Matteo,” she said quietly, “Ada knew.”
I stopped.
“Knew what?”
“Victor was moving money before she left.”
“Then why didn't you tell me?”
Meredith's expression collapsed into something almost bitter. “Because you never listened to her. Why would you listen to me?”
The elevator doors closed.
I stood there with my hand on the polished wall, thinking about the woman in the red coat. Wren remembered her ring because it flashed in the light when Meredith taped a warning to the family door. For Wren it had become the face of losing her home: a glittering green stone, a yellow notice, her father arguing politely because he still believed polite words could change an unfair decision. I wondered how many other children remembered a tiny detail from the worst day of their lives. A person's private memory could be vivid without being a complete account. We needed the records, the other witnesses, and the dates to make sense of it. Most of all, I wanted Wren to have future memories that did not begin with fear.
I stood in the hall for a long time. She had manipulated records and helped frighten families. That did not make everything she said false.
Later Quinn arranged a brief, child-sensitive conversation with Wren, attended by Ms. Brooks and a specialist trained to interview children. I was not present. They did not ask her to accuse anyone or guess at things she hadn't seen. They showed her a few photographs and asked open questions about the day evacuation notices appeared.
Wren remembered the woman with the green ring. She also remembered the vehicle parked behind the woman: a small white van with a black gull painted on one side. The same emblem we'd seen on Northline trucks.
When Quinn told me, she made an important point. “It supports the timeline. It doesn't prove Meredith knew about the fire.”
“Understood.”
“Do you?”
“I am learning.”
Wren came home from the interview tired. I asked whether she wanted to talk about it. She shook her head and went straight to Button. That evening we made pancakes for dinner at her host family's kitchen. I burned the first three. The teenager laughed so hard he nearly fell off his chair. Wren ate the fourth with strawberries and announced that my cooking career was over.
I hadn't heard a child laugh that freely in my presence before. I wished Ada could have heard it too.
At ten, Quinn called. A witness inside the ferry compound had contacted investigators through the hotline. He claimed Daniel was still being held there, unable to walk without assistance. The witness was willing to describe the entrances and guard schedule, but he feared his family would be targeted if his identity became known.
The timing of everything grew painfully clear. Daniel had hidden evidence in the locker. Victor's men had seized him. Meredith had helped erase the trails. Now the people involved were watching one another, wondering who would speak first.
I stood by the window and listened as Quinn explained the rescue plan. Medical responders would enter with officers. Civilians would be kept clear. She refused to tell me the precise hour, and I thanked her for that. It was safer for everyone.
Before the call ended she asked, “Do you want me to deliver a message?”
May you like
I looked at the drawing Wren had given me—the little house, the enormous dog, the words COME HOME.
“Tell Daniel his daughter remembers the apple tree,” I said. “And tell him she has something she wants to show him.”
