“Yeah.”
The significance of this hit her slowly, in layers. First she remembered there were no locks in the house. And second, Gavin had left the house holding it.
“Do you think it knew you had it?” she asked, worrying her lip. “Do you think the house hijacked this?”
He shook his head. “If it knew I had this, it wouldn’t have let me out at all.” He handed it over to Delilah. It was only an inch or two long and very thin, with large, flat loops across the head and a row of small, sharp teeth up one side of the stem. While she turned it over in her palm, Gavin used her phone’s Web browser to try to figure out what it might be for.
“It’s not to a locket,” he said. “It’s too big.” He scrolled farther down the page, mumbling, “Not a car, not a house, not a mailbox. . .” But then he sucked in a sharp breath and his head jerked back fractionally. “Oh.”
“Oh?”
“A safe-deposit-box key.”
Delilah took her phone from him and looked at the images he’d found. A few looked nearly identical to the key in her hand.
“Do you think it’s from a local bank?” she asked, glancing up at him.
He lifted a broad shoulder in a shrug.
“Do we know if it’s okay to do this in here?” She held up her phone. “Searching and calling? It can’t hear us in here, but we’re using the Internet. What if House—?”
He winced, but when he looked at her, his jaw was tight with determination. “Then it’s too late now. Whatever you’re thinking of doing, just do it.”
According to the woman who answered the call, safe-deposit-box keys from Kansas National were flat-headed and smooth-toothed. The second bank Delilah called didn’t even have safe-deposit boxes available to customers. But not only did the third bank she called, a Wells Fargo two miles down the highway, have keys that sounded identical to the one in her hand, they also told her—when pressed—they indeed had a box under the last name Timothy.
“Do you happen to have the first name?”
“I. . .” The reed-thin voice on the other end trailed off in an exhale.
“Please,” Delilah insisted, before impulsively pushing the speaker button. “Gavin, tell him why we need to know the name.”
Gavin cleared his throat, eyes locked on Delilah’s. “Please can you tell me the first name on the account? We think it might be my mother’s. I haven’t seen her since I was little. I found this key and need to know if it was hers.”
“Why don’t you tell me her name, and I’ll tell you if you’re right.”
Gavin closed his eyes, swallowing thickly. “Hilary? I think.”
“You think? You aren’t sure of your mother’s first name?”
“Can you just tell me if it belongs to a Hilary Timothy?” Gavin growled, and Delilah looked up into the storm of his eyes. “I have the key. I have school identification with the same last name.”
“Can you verify the address?” the man asked.
Gavin rattled off his address, and after a long pause, the man said, “Yes. It’s registered to a Hilary Timothy. She opened the account in November of 1999 but has not accessed it since February of 2000.”
“Thank you,” Delilah said, robotically hitting the end call button. She looked up at his face. Gray-blue bruises formed half circles beneath his eyes. His lips seemed even redder than they usually did, against the backdrop of his ashen skin. “That was after you were born.”
“I know.”
“Gavin, we have to see what is in there. Everything I’ve heard about your mom tells me she wasn’t a safe-deposit-box kind of gal, more of a ‘keep everything in my magical trunk’ kind of gal.”
“I know,” he said again.
“There are answers in there.”