Chapter 6: The Man at the Door
The knock came at 7:14 the next morning.
I know the time because I was standing at the kitchen counter with my coffee, watching the clock the way you do when you haven't slept well and the night felt longer than it should have.
Tara was still upstairs.
Maya was in her room.
I was the only one who heard it.
I opened the front door and found a man I'd never seen before standing on my porch.
Mid-forties.
Unshaven.
A jacket that had been good quality once, a long time ago.
He was looking past me into the house before he'd even finished saying my name.
"You Marcus?"
"Who's asking?"
"Derek Hale." He said it like I should recognize it.
Like we'd met before.
"I need to talk to Tara."
I kept my hand on the door.
"She's not available."
"I'll wait."
"No," I said.
"You won't."
He looked at me then — really looked at me — and I saw something in his face that I didn't like.
Not aggression.
Calculation.
"She told me about you," he said.
"Said you were a good guy.
Said you took in your kid, kept things stable." He paused.
"Said you didn't know about us."
"I know now."
Something shifted in his expression.
He hadn't expected that.
"She told you?"
"Enough people did."
He was quiet for a moment.
Then: "I'm not here to cause trouble.
I just need a little more help.
One more time.
Then I'm gone."
"You're gone now," I said.
"Marcus." He stepped forward slightly.
Not threatening — or trying not to look like it.
"I have things.
Letters.
Receipts.
Dates.
If this goes sideways, it doesn't just go sideways for me.
You understand what I'm saying?"
I looked at him for a long moment.
"Are you threatening my family?"
"I'm explaining the situation."
"Get off my porch."
His jaw worked.
"You don't want to do this."
"I already did it." I held the door.
"Don't come back."
I closed the door before he could answer.
I stood in the hallway and listened to his footsteps on the porch, then on the path, then gone.
I went upstairs.
Tara was awake, sitting on the edge of the bed.
She looked up when I came in.
"Was someone at the door?"
"Derek," I said.
She stood up so fast the lamp on the nightstand shook.
"What?
What did he—"
"He wanted money.
He also said he has letters and receipts and that things could go sideways." I watched her face.
"What does he have, Tara?"
She sat back down.
Her hands were in her lap, very still.
"Tara.
What does he have?"
"Proof," she said quietly.
"That I've been sending him money.
Dates.
Amounts." She looked up.
"If he showed that to anyone — to your family, to anyone — it would look like—"
"Like what?"
She didn't finish the sentence.
She didn't have to.
I sat down in the chair across from her.
"How much have you sent him total?"
She hesitated.
"How much?"
"A little over two thousand dollars," she said.
"Over eight months."
The number sat between us like something solid.
"He's not going to stop," I said.
It wasn't a question.
May you like
"No," she said.
"He's not."
