Chapter 1 - THE STRANGER WHO KISSED ME—AND THE WATCH THAT MADE MY EX RUN
The brass bell above the door had barely finished ringing when Ryan’s voice reached me from the sidewalk.
“Lily. I know you’re in there.”
I set an Edwardian brooch on its velvet tray.
Its seed pearls were no larger than grains of rice, and five seconds earlier I had been studying a repair to the clasp.
Now I could only see Ryan through the front window.
He stood beneath the gray afternoon light in a shirt he once would have ironed before going out for coffee. His hair was longer. His face looked thinner.
He had a paper cup in one hand.
His other hand was already knocking against the glass.
I had not seen him in two years.
The last time, I had opened the bedroom door of our apartment and found him with my best friend Sarah.
They had stopped laughing when they saw me.
That silence was the part I remembered most.
Not Sarah pulling the sheet against herself.
Not Ryan jumping out of bed.
Not his desperate explanation.
The silence.
Two people I trusted looking at me and realizing their private joke had suddenly become my public humiliation.
I left with two bags and my grandmother’s photograph.
I never went back for the rest.
“Who is that?” asked the customer near the pocket-watch case.
“A person I don’t want to speak to.”
The man wore a dark charcoal coat and an expensive watch.
He had come into Ambridge Antiques shortly before Ryan appeared and spent several minutes examining a Victorian pocket watch engraved with a hunting scene.
I knew nothing else about him.
Mrs. Chen, the owner of the shop, was across town meeting an estate seller, leaving me alone to run the store.
Ryan came closer to the glass.
“You can’t avoid me forever.”
“I’ve managed two years,” I said, though he could not hear me.
The stranger glanced toward the door.
I had locked it after Mrs. Chen left, our usual practice when one employee worked alone.
Ryan tried the handle.
Its old brass plate rattled against the frame.
“I can ask him to leave,” the stranger said.
“I’ll call for help if I need to.”
Ryan knocked hard enough to make the display near the window tremble.
“Five minutes, Lily. That’s all I want.”
I took out my phone and called the nonemergency number I had used once before when a man refused to leave the shop.
As I described the situation, Ryan raised his voice.
“Sarah meant nothing. You know that, don’t you?”
I turned my back to the window.
Interesting.
Two years later, and somehow his apology was still an insult to someone else.
Sarah meant nothing.
As though that made sleeping with her better.
The dispatcher said someone would come by.
I gave the address and put my phone on the counter.
The stranger had moved between me and the door.
He did not touch me.
“Does he always mistake a refusal for an invitation?” he asked.
“Ryan thinks waiting long enough makes him right.”
“He can see us from there.”
“I know.”
Ryan struck the glass with the flat of his hand.
I flinched.
The stranger saw it.
His expression changed almost imperceptibly.
“I could give him a reason to believe you’ve moved on.”
I stared.
“Only if you want that.”
“What kind of reason?”
He held my gaze.
“A kiss.”
It was a startling offer from a man whose name I did not know.
I looked toward the sidewalk.
Ryan was watching me through the glass, ready to turn any reply into another conversation.
I looked back at the stranger.
“One kiss.”
He waited.
“Then you step away.”
“I will.”
I nodded.
He leaned in.
The kiss was brief.
Warm.
Controlled.
One of his hands rested against the edge of the counter rather than on me.
When he drew back, my pulse was racing.
He had already put space between us.
Ryan stood motionless outside.
Then his eyes dropped.
Not to my mouth.
Not to the stranger’s face.
To his watch.
Ryan’s face lost color.
He backed away from the window.
Actually stumbled off the curb.
Then turned and hurried down the street.
The stranger watched until Ryan disappeared around the corner.
Then faced me.
“Are you all right?”
“I don’t know.”
I touched the counter.
“Who are you?”
“Kieran Volkov.”
The name stirred a half-remembered warning I could not place.
Whatever Ryan knew about Kieran Volkov had frightened him more than finding me kissing another man.
Then I remembered.
Volkov.
Chicago newspapers used the name carefully.
Volkov Shipping.
Volkov Security.
Volkov Development.
And rumors.
Always rumors.
A Russian-American family whose legitimate companies stretched across the city and whose unofficial influence stretched much farther.
Kieran Volkov was supposedly the man who inherited all of it after his father died.
Some articles called him an entrepreneur.
Others called him a suspected organized-crime figure.
Nobody ever seemed to prove anything.
I stared at him.
“You’re that Kieran Volkov?”
One corner of his mouth moved.
“I’m not aware of another.”
I looked at the door Ryan had abandoned.
“You frightened him.”
“I noticed.”
“Why?”
“That interests me too.”
He looked toward the Victorian pocket watch again.
Then at me.
“Lily what?”
I hesitated.
“Bennett.”
Something changed in his expression.
Not recognition exactly.
Calculation.
“Bennett?”
“Yes.”
“Your grandmother?”
“Evelyn Bennett.”
This time there was no mistaking his reaction.
Kieran became completely still.
“How do you know my grandmother?”
Before he answered, blue lights appeared outside.
The police had arrived.
Ryan was gone.
The officer took my statement, checked the street, and recommended I document any future contact.
Kieran waited quietly.
When the officer left, I turned toward him.
“My grandmother.”
He looked at the pocket watch.
“Where did this come from?”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“No.”
“Then answer it.”
His eyes returned to mine.
“I came here because of that watch.”
I folded my arms.
“You were pretending to shop?”
“I was shopping.”
“For one specific item.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because my father owned it twenty-seven years ago.”
I looked at the watch.
“That’s impossible.”
“Why?”
“Mrs. Chen bought it from an estate in Evanston last month.”
“Whose estate?”
“I’m not allowed to give customer information.”
“Good.”
I blinked.
“Good?”
“I prefer people who understand confidentiality.”
“You’re avoiding my question.”
“Yes.”
At least he was honest.
I walked behind the counter and removed the pocket watch.
Heavy silver.
Late Victorian.
A hunter and two dogs engraved on the case.
Mrs. Chen had dated it around 1895.
I opened the back.
Inside were initials.
N.V.
I had assumed they belonged to the original owner.
Kieran stared.
“My father was Nikolai Volkov.”
“N.V.”
“Yes.”
“How did an antique from the nineteenth century become his?”
“My grandfather gave it to him.”
“And then?”
“It disappeared the night my father was murdered.”
My fingers tightened around the watch.
I carefully placed it down.
“You should have started with that.”
“I wasn’t sure it was the same watch.”
“And now?”
“It is.”
“How?”
He tapped the engraving.
“There’s a mistake.”
I looked.
“One dog has six toes.”
I examined it.
He was right.
“My grandfather commissioned that engraving after purchasing the watch in London. The engraver made an error.”
“And your father had it when he died?”
“Yes.”
“What does this have to do with my grandmother?”
Kieran reached inside his coat.
I stiffened.
He noticed and stopped.
“Photograph.”
“Slowly.”
He removed his hand.
A photograph.
He placed it on the counter.
Two people stood outside a restaurant.
One was a younger Nikolai Volkov.
I knew the woman beside him immediately.
Grandma Evelyn.
My breath caught.
“That’s her.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“1998.”
The year before my mother died.
“What was she doing with your father?”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
“I was eight.”
He nodded.
The photograph showed my grandmother holding something.
A small velvet box.
Kieran pointed.
“That box contained this watch.”
I stared at him.
“You think my grandmother stole it?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“I think my father gave it to her.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
I studied him.
“And Ryan?”
Kieran’s eyes hardened.
“What does your ex do?”
“He’s an accountant.”
“Where?”
“Different firms. The last I heard, Harrow Financial.”
Kieran’s expression changed.
“What?”
“Harrow?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“I don’t know. Maybe three years.”
He took out his phone.
“Who are you calling?”
“My security director.”
“No.”
He stopped.
“This is my workplace. You don’t start bringing armed men into it.”
A pause.
Then he put the phone away.
“Fair.”
That surprised me.
“You actually listened.”
“You sound disappointed.”
“I’m recalibrating.”
That almost made him smile.
The bell above the door rang.
Mrs. Chen.
She entered carrying an umbrella.
“Lily, you would not believe—”
Then she saw Kieran.
The color drained from her face.
Kieran noticed.
So did I.
“Mrs. Chen?”
She looked at the pocket watch.
Then at Kieran.
“Oh,” she whispered.
“You know him?”
She closed the door.
Locked it.
“Kieran Volkov.”
Kieran’s expression sharpened.
“You know me.”
“I knew your father.”
Silence.
I stared at her.
Apparently everyone in my life had been attending secret meetings with Mafia families except me.
Mrs. Chen put down her umbrella.
“Where did you get the watch?” Kieran asked.
She looked at me.
Then him.
“From Evelyn Bennett’s estate.”
My blood went cold.
“What?”
I stepped forward.
“Grandma’s estate was settled six years ago.”
Mrs. Chen shook her head.
“Not everything.”
She looked guilty.
“Your grandmother left a storage unit under another name.”
“How did you get access?”
“She named me executor for its contents.”
“You never told me.”
“She made me promise.”
I laughed once.
Not because anything was funny.
“Of course she did.”
Kieran’s voice became quiet.
“What else was inside?”
Mrs. Chen looked frightened.
“A ledger.”
Kieran stopped breathing.
“What ledger?”
“I don’t know. Evelyn removed it before she died.”
“Where?”
“She gave it to Lily.”
I stared.
“No, she didn’t.”
Mrs. Chen looked directly at me.
“Yes, she did.”
“When?”
“Your twenty-first birthday.”
I tried to remember.
Grandma had given me a wooden music box.
Old.
Beautiful.
I still owned it.
Inside my apartment.
My phone rang.
Ryan.
I declined.
He called again.
Then a text arrived.
LILY, LISTEN TO ME. DO NOT TRUST VOLKOV. GET RID OF THE WATCH AND WHATEVER YOUR GRANDMOTHER LEFT YOU.
My blood went cold.
I showed Kieran.
His face became unreadable.
“How does Ryan know?”
“I don’t know.”
Another message arrived.
YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT KIERAN’S FAMILY DID TO YOURS.
Then another.
ASK HIM WHO KILLED YOUR MOTHER.
I looked up.
Kieran had read it.
For the first time since he entered the shop, the calm disappeared from his face.
“Kieran.”
He said nothing.
“My mother died in a car accident.”
His silence terrified me.
“Kieran.”
“I know.”
My heart stopped.
“What?”
“I know how your mother died.”
I stepped back.
“How?”
“Because my father died the same night.”
The room went completely silent.
Twenty-seven years earlier, my mother and Kieran’s father had apparently died on the same night.
My grandmother had possessed his watch.
She had hidden a ledger.
Ryan knew about it.
And the stranger I had kissed less than an hour earlier had not walked into Ambridge Antiques by accident.
May you like
Kieran Volkov had come looking for a secret my family had kept for almost three decades.
And somehow, without realizing it, I had been carrying the key to that secret since my twenty-first birthday.
Related Stories
