Chapter 3 — My Mother’s Other Son

The investigator called while I was sitting in the bank lobby.

“My name is Lena Ortiz,” she said. “You left me a message about the side entrance.”

“Yes. I need to tell you something my mother said to me.”

“Is this a good time to speak?”

I looked at the teller windows. “Give me five minutes.”

I went outside and stood beneath the awning, where the rain couldn’t reach my phone. I told Ortiz that Marianne had admitted setting the fire and had said she watched the restaurant before going in. I gave her Natalie’s words as closely as I could remember them.

Ortiz let me finish.

“Did either of them say how they entered?” she asked.

“No. Natalie knew I kept a spare key in the office safe. She had seen me change the alarm code.”

“Please don’t confront anyone to find out more,” Ortiz said. “Send me the messages you mentioned and the notes you made after the conversation. I’d like to meet you at the site this afternoon.”

I agreed. Only after I hung up did I notice my hand shaking.

Inside, the banker printed my account activity. Nothing had disappeared. I moved the payroll funds into an account that only I could access and changed my passwords while I was still at her desk.

My mother had been listed as an emergency contact since I opened the business. That had seemed harmless yesterday. I replaced her name with Rosa’s.

Claire called before I left the bank. She had reviewed the hours Rosa sent me.

“I can cover the gap,” she said. “We’ll put it in writing. Pay me back when you can.”

“That could take months.”

“I know.”

I sat down on a bench outside. “Why are you doing this?”

“Because you paid my first warehouse deposit when I couldn’t get a bank to return my calls.”

“That was years ago.”

“I remember.”

I did too. Claire had arrived at my apartment with a business plan and an expression I had never seen on her before: afraid to ask. I had given her what I’d saved for culinary school. She had insisted on drawing up an agreement, even though I kept telling her I wasn’t expecting anything back.

“Thank you,” I said.

“Pay your people. We’ll talk after.”

By noon, I had arranged transfers for Friday. Rosa called twice to confirm the amounts. I told her to keep every fire-related receipt and to send me anything she remembered about the final night.

“There’s one thing,” she said. “The back hallway camera wasn’t on the office system.”

I stopped walking. “It feeds through the security company.”

“Right. You installed it after somebody kept propping the delivery door open. I didn’t see its footage when we checked the office computer.”

I had forgotten about that camera.

I called the security company and asked them to preserve the footage from the night of the fire. They said they could make a copy available to the investigator once they received her request. I passed Ortiz the contact information immediately.

At the restaurant, Ortiz met me beside the side door. She wore a dark rain jacket and carried a folder protected by a plastic sleeve.

“We’re still establishing where the fire began,” she said. “I can’t tell you yet who started it.”

“I understand.”

She asked me to show her how the staff entered, who had keys, and where we kept cleaning supplies. I answered what I knew and admitted when I didn’t. In the office, the ceiling had come down over my desk. The ring was still somewhere under it.

I didn’t ask anyone to look for it.

When we reached the back hallway, Ortiz asked whether I could obtain the employee schedule. I had it on my phone. Luis had clocked out at 12:18 a.m.; Rosa at 12:31. The first emergency call had come after one.

“My mother said she waited until everyone left,” I told her.

Ortiz wrote that down. “We’ll check it against the other records.”

By the time I returned to my car, Evan was leaning against it.

He wore a clean camel coat and shoes that had never seen a kitchen floor. He looked at the boarded restaurant, then at me.

“Mom says you scared her.”

“She told me she set the fire.”

“She’s distraught. People say things when they’re distraught.”

“She told me why.”

Evan slipped his hands into his pockets. “Then you know she’s been worried about me.”

I had known Evan since I was eleven and he was thirteen. Marianne introduced him as the son of an old friend who needed a place to stay. His father had died that year. My father gave Evan his room for the first month while I slept on the pullout sofa.

After my father died, Evan stayed. Marianne called him her son whenever it suited her and her friend’s boy whenever someone asked why she paid his bills. I had stopped trying to understand it.

“Why does she call you Cross?” I asked.

“It’s my name.”

“She knew your father before she met mine.”

His smile thinned. “You finally figured that out.”

I remembered my father’s last week in the hospital. Marianne had missed the only evening he was awake enough to ask for her. She said Evan needed a ride home. I had driven over to bring her back, but they were gone by the time I arrived.

I used to think of that night whenever I felt guilty for being angry with her.

Now I wondered how many other memories I had explained away.

“You let her do it,” I said.

“You’re asking me to account for something Mom may or may not have done.”

“Did you know she was going to my restaurant?”

Evan looked toward the side door. “Your lawyer would tell you to stop talking.”

“I don’t have a lawyer.”

“You should get one.”

He pushed away from my car, pleased with himself for offering useful advice.

“What did Natalie tell you?” I asked.

That stopped him.

“She’s upset,” he said.

“She told me she’s pregnant.”

His eyes moved to my face, searching for how much I knew. I gave him nothing.

“Don’t drag her into your fight with Mom,” he said.

“I didn’t bring her here.”

For the first time, Evan lost his easy expression. He stepped closer, lowering his voice so Ortiz, still inside the building, couldn’t hear.

“You think that place made you better than me. It didn’t. All it took was one bad night.”

I took out my phone, held it where he could see it, and called Ortiz.

Evan straightened. “Seriously?”

“She’s still here,” I said. “You can tell her what you just told me.”

I gave her his name when she answered. I said he was standing outside the restaurant and had mentioned the night of the fire. I did not claim he had confessed.

Evan watched me with a look I had seen across family dinner tables for years. Usually I lowered my eyes and let the moment pass.

This time I stayed where I was.

The side door opened. Ortiz came out, pulling it shut behind her.

Evan’s gaze moved from her to the black security camera mounted above the delivery entrance. His face changed before he could stop it.

Ortiz noticed.

“Mr. Cross?” she said. “I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

Evan looked at me once more. Then he looked up at the camera again.