Caleb could feel Noah watching him as he approached the two strangers. The older man introduced himself as Martin Vale, a lawyer from Columbus. His companion, Simon Reed, said he worked with a nonprofit legal clinic. Neither ordered food.
Their shoes were clean despite the storm, which meant someone had dropped them directly at the entrance. Vale placed a business card on the counter, then carefully turned over the photograph in his hand. Noah stayed beside them. It showed a woman standing between two little boys outside a brick apartment building.
Noah was younger, his hair longer. Eli wore a paper birthday crown and held a toy truck. Beside them stood a tall man with grease on his work shirt. Caleb studied the man's face, searching his memory.
The building behind them had been demolished three years earlier. "Do you know these children?" Vale asked. Caleb glanced toward the booth. "I know they're eating dinner.
That's all you need to know unless you tell me why you're asking." Reed exchanged a quick look with the lawyer. "Their mother, Marisol Bennett, gave our office instructions before she died. We've been searching for the boys for nine days. We believe someone intercepted the paperwork that was supposed to protect them." Caleb had heard of Marisol.
She once organized tenants at the condemned Westbridge Apartments, speaking at council meetings while contractors called the residents unreasonable. When the building closed, she vanished from local news. Caleb remembered her because his own mother had worked in its laundry room. "Why come to me?" he asked.
Vale produced a second picture: Caleb leaving a grocery store that afternoon, carrying bread and a small paper sack. Across the street, Noah and Eli could be seen sheltering beneath a bus awning. "A volunteer saw you speak with them," Vale said. "She recognized them after seeing a missing-person notice circulated privately among aid workers.
She called us." Caleb disliked how easily adults could follow children without their knowledge, even when they claimed to mean well. "I gave them directions," he said. "They came here on their own." "That matters," Reed replied. "They are not suspects.
They're potential witnesses." At the booth, Noah slid halfway out of his seat, ready to run. Caleb raised his palm to signal that he should stay. The lawyer saw the movement, then lowered his voice. "Someone filed a petition yesterday claiming the boys have no surviving relatives," Vale said.
"The petition contains a signature that shouldn't exist. Their mother supposedly signed it two weeks after her funeral." The kitchen door swung open behind Caleb. Victor Raines emerged, irritated by the noise. When he saw the photograph, every trace of annoyance drained from his face.