Chapter 14 - THE PACKAGE
It was not a recording.
Not a confession.
Not instructions.
A shipping label.
Old.
Folded twice and wedged beneath the internal mounting plate.
Redline Practical.
Recipient:
JASON BENNETT — PERSONAL STORAGE
Warehouse location:
Unit 44.
Marissa frowned.
“Jason had a storage unit?”
Theo nodded.
They were back at Nina's office.
“I knew about a company unit. Not personal.”
The label included a facility name.
Canton Self Storage.
The facility still existed.
Records did too.
Jason rented Unit 44 in 2019.
Small.
Paid automatically.
After his death, the account did not close.
Someone continued paying.
Marissa stared.
“Who?”
The facility manager could not simply release account details because Marissa asked.
Jason's estate obtained them properly.
Payment card:
Beverly Bennett.
Marissa felt her anger rise again.
Then Beverly's attorney produced an explanation.
Jason asked his mother years earlier to keep the storage autopay on her card because Redline's reimbursement system was unreliable.
She forgot about it after he died.
Automatic charges continued.
Possible.
Records supported the card had been on file since 2020.
Not a secret recent payment.
Who accessed the unit?
Jason.
Theo twice.
Beverly once after Jason died.
Marissa stared.
“When?”
Three weeks after the funeral.
Beverly admitted it.
Jason's estate paperwork listed the unit.
She went with an estate inventory employee.
Removed:
Two toolboxes.
Old tax files.
One case of childhood photographs.
Several Redline props.
“What happened to them?”
“Most went into my garage.”
Beverly answered through counsel.
The black controller?
She said she had not seen it.
But her signature was on the 2022 disposal sheet.
Why?
Jason had brought several recalled props to his parents' garage while Redline arranged disposal.
Beverly signed as witness because Jason needed a second adult to certify the load.
She remembered the black boxes generally.
Not individual serials.
Possible.
Theo could not contradict it.
Then:
Who mailed Prototype Seventeen to Marissa?
Not Beverly.
At least no evidence showed it.
The package label from the morning of the assault had been generated through a commercial shipping counter.
Sender field:
J. BENNETT ARCHIVE
No real address.
Security footage from the shipping location no longer available by the time anyone knew to ask.
Marissa felt absurdly disappointed.
“So that's it.”
Detective Pierce said:
“Not exactly.”
The cardboard box had been sealed with Redline inventory tape.
Old stock.
Theo said the company stopped using that tape four years earlier.
Meaning the sender likely had access to Jason's old storage materials.
Could still be anyone from Redline.
Could be Beverly's garage.
Could be Unit 44.
Then Theo said:
“Wait.”
He looked at the old internal label.
“Unit 44 wasn't empty.”
Marissa turned.
“What?”
“After Jason died?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know?”
“I went.”
“When?”
“About six months ago.”
“Why?”
Theo looked embarrassed.
“I had Redline-owned gear in there.”
“Did you tell Beverly?”
“No.”
“Me?”
“No.”
“Of course not.”
Theo took that.
He entered using an access code Jason had given him years earlier.
Improper after Jason's death.
He knew that now.
Inside, he saw:
Two shelving units.
One locked metal trunk.
A stack of Redline cases.
And a banker box labeled:
MARISSA — HOUSE / TRUST
Marissa went still.
“Did you open it?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“It wasn't mine.”
Finally someone in this family had apparently found a box and not opened it.
“What happened?”
Theo returned two weeks later with estate counsel authorization.
Unit had been cleared.
Everything gone.
By who?
Records showed one access in between.
Authorized secondary user:
B. Bennett.
Beverly.
She said she had not returned.
Her attorney requested the entry photo.
The facility's gate camera showed a vehicle.
Not Beverly's.
A dark Subaru.
Driver's face unclear.
Access credential:
Beverly's.
The trust mystery had mostly been solved.
The assault case was moving.
May you like
But someone else had used Beverly's storage credentials and removed a box Jason had labeled for Marissa.
And months later, one item from that old storage had been mailed directly to her.
