Surviving Ice (Burying Water, #4)(7)

I never saw it that way, though. I was only ten when it happened, too young to really grasp what was going on. After Jun and Ian moved away, I asked Ned why. He said that sometimes people make horrible, stupid mistakes and sometimes other people can’t forgive them for it.

I told Ned I forgave him, and that was that.

Ian’s thirty now—five years old than me—so we were never especially close growing up, and had even less of a reason to stay in touch after he moved away. It wasn’t until I was finishing high school that we reconnected over email and our love of art. Sharing the same passions helps us understand each other. Very few people truly get me. My parents and brothers sure don’t. Ned was one. Ian is the other.

I shrug. “I guess that’s why he included me, too.” Not only am I inheriting half of Ned’s estate, he named me executor. What the f*ck was he thinking? Me? Dealing with lawyers and real estate agents? It’s a sizable inheritance, with this shop and a small three-bedroom house in Ingleside. The house has got a hefty mortgage to go along with it, and it’s seen much better days, but it will fetch an easy seven hundred, as is.

“What the hell are we going to do with this place, Ivy?” He shakes his head, punching buttons until the cash register pops open to reveal an empty drawer.

Just like that guy did only days ago.

I squeeze my eyes shut and shiver at the memory. It’s one of a few that keep replaying in my head at odd times throughout the day and night, with no warning. The ding of the register, the buzzing of Ned’s tattoo machine. The cool metal desk against my skin as I hid.

The blood splatter on that guy’s wrist.

The cops blame my fuzzy memory on shock. They say I may remember more with time.

But a part of me hopes I don’t.

“Black Rabbit’s got a great reputation, a loyal clientele. It makes decent money. And we’ll make enough from the sale of the house to pay off the mortgage on the building.” After a messy and expensive run-in with the IRS back in the ’90s, Ned learned how to keep proper files and pay his taxes and bills on time. Ian and I were able to get a good understanding of the business affairs in one evening of going through the files. We know that he borrowed a hundred thousand against the building—that was previously paid off—only a month ago. But what that money went to, neither of us has any idea. It sure as hell wasn’t upgrades. And Ned’s bank account is bone dry, which we discovered when making funeral arrangements. It makes no sense, given how well he did here. He didn’t employ anyone besides me, and he didn’t pay me an hourly salary, because he let me take home all my earnings, without any chair rental fees.

Ned did like to gamble, but it was always low-key betting—day trips to the racetracks, poker nights, some online stuff—so if he was into someone for a hundred K, I’d be surprised.

But there’s also no sign of that money, which makes me wonder.

“I can’t run this place from Dublin and I’m not abandoning my own shop to keep it going,” Ian says.

“You’d make more money here, though . . .” The Fine Needle, Ian’s shop in Dublin, is great—small and full of character. But it’ll never compete against a well-established business in San Francisco when you’re weighing dollar bills. I know that argument is pointless, though. I knew before the words even left my mouth. Ian is about political movements and the environment. He’s about books and learning and experiencing life. He’s never been about money.

“And I’d get to deal with Ned’s amazing clientele, right?” He snorts. “You heard the cops. This is probably tied to one of them. I really don’t want to end up like that.”

“They’re reaching for the easiest answer because they can’t find another one.” A good third of Ned’s customer base are bikers and, while most of them are just that—guys who ride motorcycles—Ned also found himself catering to Devil’s Iron, the one percent who do more than simply “ride bikes.” The cops are having a field day right now, going through potential motives and enemies. They have no other explanation for why two masked men would show up here, empty the register—which had maybe a grand sitting in it—and murder him and a customer.

Ian snorts. “Besides, I’m guessing there won’t be too many rednecks and bikers coming in here to get their work done by a California Roll.”

“They might, if the California Roll is Ned’s son.” I smile, despite the derogatory name. I heard it plenty growing up in San Fran, before my family decided they wanted me as far away from my uncle’s bad influence as possible. Ian and I are both children of interracial couples. Ned was as white as white can get—born and raised in New Mexico before moving to California and charming a Chinese-American girl named Jun—my dad’s sister—with his bad boy ways at a local grocery store.

The result of Jun and Ned’s union is a skinny, nonathletic version of Brandon Lee.

I, on the other hand, am a Spanish-Chinese mix. My mother was raised outside Madrid. She met my dad while attending college on a Spanish exchange program. I was actually born in Spain, which technically makes me something other than a Chinese American, but kids are stupid.

“Or Ned’s niece.” Ian meets my dark eyes with ones of his own. “This place means way more to you than it does me. What if we keep it and you manage it?”