Chapter 2 – THE HOUSE ON HAWTHORNE STREET

“I did,” Marco said.

Anna stared at him.

He was still standing beside the dining table, looking at the brass key.

“I authorized new locks after the roof contractor reported that the back door wouldn’t close properly.”

Bianca lifted her chin.

“There. You see? This is exactly what I’ve been trying to explain.”

Marco ignored her.

“But I never told you to keep Anna out.”

He looked at his sister.

“I asked Bianca to make sure you received a new key.”

Anna slowly turned toward Bianca.

“You told me he’d taken mine away because he didn’t trust me.”

“The old locks weren’t secure,” Bianca replied.

“That’s not what you said.”

“Perhaps you misunderstood.”

Anna gave her a long look.

“No. I remember exactly how you said it.”

I was standing near the sideboard, where the untouched lemon cake waited beneath a glass cover.

It felt strange that a celebration could turn into something so ugly while the cake sat there looking perfect.

Marco picked up the key.

Its little brass teeth were worn smooth in places.

“Mom had this made for you when you finished treatment,” he said.

Anna nodded.

“She put a blue ribbon on it. I lost the ribbon years ago.”

“I remember.”

Their eyes met.

It was a small, ordinary memory.

For a moment, they looked like the brother and sister they’d been before Bianca entered their lives.

Then Anna looked away.

“I drove past the house twice last winter,” she said. “I couldn’t make myself stop.”

Marco’s fingers closed around the key.

“Why?”

“Because I thought you’d asked for me to stay away.”

He sat down.

“Anna, I was afraid you were sick again. Bianca told me you didn’t want visitors.”

“And you believed her.”

He didn’t answer quickly enough.

Anna nodded.

“That tells me something.”

“Annie, I wanted to come.”

“But you didn’t.”

There was no accusation in her voice.

That made it worse.

Marco looked down at his hands.

When Anna had been drinking, years earlier, he’d spent countless nights trying to help her. I’d heard enough about that time to understand how frightened he’d been of losing her.

But Anna had spent ten sober years building a different life.

And he’d allowed someone else to convince him that the life she’d built had disappeared.

“I should have come anyway,” he said.

“Yes,” she answered quietly. “You should have.”

Bianca pulled out a chair.

“Can we please stop acting as though one misunderstanding erases everything I’ve done for this family?”

Marco looked up.

“What have you done, Bianca?”

“I’ve arranged contractors, paid attention to a house you barely visit, handled insurance paperwork, and tried to spare you another emotional crisis.”

“By lying to my sister?”

“By keeping things manageable.”

Anna leaned back.

“Manageable for whom?”

Bianca looked genuinely exhausted.

“You have no idea how much work goes into keeping this household running while Marco handles his business.”

I glanced around the dining room.

The flowers I’d arranged that morning were beginning to wilt in the heat.

I had spent two days preparing the table, ordering linens, polishing silver, and checking dietary preferences.

Bianca had worked hard on the engagement dinner too. That much was true.

But hard work didn’t give her the right to decide who belonged at it.

Marco tapped the property authorization.

“What exactly were you arranging at Hawthorne Street?”

“Repairs. A valuation. Possibly a better long-term use for the building.”

“What use?”

She hesitated.

“A renovation project.”

Anna looked at her.

“What kind of renovation?”

“Something practical.”

“That isn’t an answer.”

Bianca turned to Marco.

“You know that property is deteriorating. Your mother wouldn’t have wanted you throwing money away.”

“My mother also wouldn’t have wanted anyone telling Anna she wasn’t welcome.”

Bianca’s jaw tightened.

I expected Marco to order her out.

Instead, he asked a question that surprised me.

“When was the last time either of you actually went inside?”

Anna looked down.

“Almost a year ago.”

Bianca said, “I went with the contractors in September.”

Marco nodded slowly.

“I haven’t been inside since the anniversary of Mom’s death.”

Anna looked at him.

“Four years, Marco.”

“I know.”

He rubbed his forehead.

“I kept telling myself I’d go back when I had time.”

Anna’s expression softened, just a little.

“It’s hard,” she said. “Everything’s still hers in there.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Something about his answer made her look up sharply.

“What do you mean?”

He hesitated.

“Bianca told me she’d arranged storage for some of the furniture while the contractors worked.”

Anna’s face went pale.

“What furniture?”

“Annie, I don’t know the details.”

“Did she move Mom’s dining table?”

Bianca spoke quickly.

“It was necessary to clear the rooms.”

Anna stood.

“That table belonged to our grandmother.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t.”

Her voice rose for the first time.

“You never sat at that table when Mom was making Sunday dinner. You never watched her spread newspapers over it while she polished the silver. You don’t know what it means.”

Bianca pushed back her chair.

“Anna, I understand sentimental attachment, but an old table isn’t worth preserving a damaged building.”

“Did you move it?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“Storage.”

“What storage?”

Bianca looked toward Marco.

“I don’t have the address memorized.”

Anna’s eyes filled.

I remembered her telling me that afternoon how her mother used to let the neighborhood children borrow books from the little shelves in the front room.

She’d spoken about the house as though it were still alive.

Now she was discovering that people had been taking it apart without telling her.

Marco stood.

“Find the inventory.”

“Marco—”

“Every item. Every room. I want to know what was removed and where it went.”

Bianca pressed her lips together.

“Fine.”

She took a leather folder from the chair beside hers.

I recognized it.

I’d placed it there before dinner when Bianca said she might need the final seating arrangements.

She opened it and removed several invoices.

“Here’s the storage company. Here’s the contractor. Here’s the valuation.”

Marco spread them across the table.

Anna moved closer.

I brought the small reading lamp from the sideboard. The chandelier light was too warm to make out the fine print.

“Thank you, Katie,” Anna murmured.

On the first invoice, beneath the property address, was a description of the work.

Anna swallowed.

“What does that mean?”

Bianca answered.

“They needed access to the walls and wiring.”

Marco looked at the next page.

It contained a floor plan.

The old kitchen was marked in blue pencil.

So was the front sitting room.

Anna leaned over it.

“Why is there an X over Mom’s bookshelves?”

Nobody answered.

She pointed to another mark.

“And the wall beside the fireplace?”

Bianca sighed.

“It’s a preliminary design. Nothing’s been approved.”

Marco studied the drawing.

I could see a note along the bottom.

He read it aloud.

“Vacant possession to be confirmed before structural removal.”

Anna looked at him.

“What does vacant possession mean?”

Marco didn’t answer immediately.

Bianca reached for the plan.

“It’s standard terminology.”

Marco kept his hand on the paper.

“Standard for what?”

“Construction.”

“Or a sale?”

Bianca’s face flushed.

Anna took the last page.

It was a printed inventory of the house.

Kitchen appliances.

Two sofas.

Dining table.

Bedroom furniture.

The list went on.

Anna searched it carefully.

Then she looked up.

“Where are the books?”

Bianca frowned.

“What books?”

“My mother’s books. There were hundreds.”

Marco turned toward her.

“Annie—”

“She kept every one of them. Even the paperbacks with the broken spines. She wrote people’s names inside the covers so she knew who’d borrowed them.”

Her finger moved down the inventory.

There were no books listed.

Not one.

Anna looked at Bianca.

“Where did you put my mother’s library?”

Bianca hesitated.

And then she said something none of us expected.

“I didn’t put it anywhere. The clearance crew was told to dispose of it.”

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