“Take it.” She shoved it into Dylan’s arms. He looked down into it, some clothes and photos, envelopes, mugs, and a dog-eared calendar.
“Sorry,” he said as he scrambled to get a grip on it. “What’s this?”
“She moved,” the woman said. The tartness in her voice was just a bit bitter. “Her and her boyfriend were leaving the city for a fresh start. Nice for some, but I’m not keeping her things forever.”
She stepped out into the hall, forcing Dylan back a step, and turned to lock the door behind her.
“Moved to where?”
“Don’t know,” the woman said. “Don’t care.”
She flipped her hair and started to stalk away. Her indignation got her halfway down the corridor and she stopped, shoulders sinking as she sighed. She turned around to look at Dylan.
“I don’t know, I didn’t approve,” she said. “And I didn’t know her that well. We only met last year after her wedding was called off and she needed a roommate. I’m sorry if she was your friend, I know she cut a lot of you off after that, but I can’t help you. And I couldn’t help her either, so now I have to focus on me. So if that’s all…?”
She trailed off and raised her eyebrows. When Dylan nodded, she turned and headed on toward the stairs. Once he was alone, Dylan braced the box on his hip to free up one hand to sort through it.
There was a photo of Irene and the wolf, back when he was just a man with bad choices, as they sat in front of a cafe and grinned at the camera. They looked happy. At the bottom of the box, tied together with a couple of brittle rubber bands, were letters.
Dylan pulled them out. The first, on top, was dated from the the first of December, and the return address on the envelope read “Demre and Hill.” He slid his thumb under the elastic band but before he could snap it off his phone rang.
It took a second for Dylan to work out how to juggle everything in his hands. He dropped the box onto the ground, stuck the letters into his pocket, and pulled out his phone. The number on the screen wasn’t familiar. He swiped to pick up the call and lifted it to his ear.
“What did I tell you, Mr. Hollie,” Lund said in a tight, angry voice. “There’s only so much I can do, especially when you keep things from me.”
Dylan wasn’t sure what she meant, but he had a feeling it wasn’t the Santa thing.
“What are you talking about?” he asked as he tucked the phone against his ear and bent down to pick the box back up. He let it dangle from one hand as he headed toward the stairs.
“Bury.”
“Who?”
“Where,” Lund corrected. “Bury, Montana. Sound familiar?”
“No. Should it?”
Dylan pushed the door to the stairwell open and braced it with his foot as he angled the box through the narrow gap. He heard the sound of typing on the other end of the call.
“It’s two hundred miles away,” Lund said. “An old lumber town, although the mill closed about a decade ago. The Jeep that caused the accident was stolen from a ranch out there earlier this year.”
Dylan’s feet scuffed off the stairs as he climbed. “Do you think they went back there?”
“Do you?”
“I don’t…” Dylan stopped. He balanced the box on the rail and frowned as he adjusted the phone against his ear. “You think this matters. I don’t see how.”
“No?” Lund said. “You don’t think it’s interesting that Bury is your hometown?”
Surprise nearly made Dylan drop the box into the stairwell. He steadied it as he considered that bit of information.
“I…”
“Mr. Hollie, please don’t try and pretend you didn’t know where you grew up.”
“I suppose I did,” Dylan said. It was probably written down in a bunch of places, but he’d never thought to look for it. Most of the time he tried not to think too much about his childhood. Even last year, when he’d racked his brain for anysliverof memory about his grandfather being Santa, he’d not thought about the place he’d been in. “It’s just been a long time.”
Lund made an annoyed sound through her teeth and then took a drink of something.
