Out her windshield, she saw that in her blind flight from the key shop she had made it all the way down to Akron. She must have gone the wrong way on I-77. Jesus. She had to stop driving and think. Iris pulled off the highway at Route 59 and managed to navigate her way to an open parking meter somewhere downtown.

The tallest building as far as the eye could see was an art deco, brick-and-stone high-rise not unlike the abandoned bank that was driving her to the brink of insanity. The letters at the top of the tower read “Capital Bank.” The sign gave her an idea. Iris got out of the car.

The bronze-and-glass revolving doors were almost identical to the First Bank of Cleveland’s. She pushed through them into a small lobby. There was a security desk in the corner.

“Um, excuse me?” she asked a rotund guard sitting on an absurdly tiny stool. “Who do I see about opening a safe deposit box?”

“Down the stairs, to your right.” The guard pointed to a narrow set of stairs off the lobby.

At the bottom of the stairs on the right was a door marked “Deposits.” Inside she found a small room and a large woman stuffed behind a crowded desk. The clerk looked a bit like Iris’s mother, with her ruddy cheeks and tight-permed hair.

“Can I help you, dear?” The woman smiled up at her.

“I’m thinking about renting a safe deposit box.” Iris took the seat in front of the woman’s cramped workstation.

“Wonderful. You’ll need to fill out this form.”

She handed Iris a clipboard and went back to typing something onto her huge computer monitor. Iris skimmed the sheet. It wanted to know her name, address, social security number, and other typical information.

“Could I ask a few questions first?”

“Sure, honey.” The woman pulled her reading glasses off of her nose and let them dangle from a neon-pink cord around her neck.

“Where are the boxes kept?”

“In the vault. It’s through that door.” She pointed to a solid wood door opposite the one Iris had walked through.

“How do I know that my things will be safe?”

“Would you like to see inside the vault, dear?”

Iris nodded eagerly.

The woman sighed ever so faintly and hoisted her girth off her ergonomic chair. She selected a key from the stretched spiral band on her plump wrist, then led Iris down a narrow hallway, through a round steel opening, and into a room full of locked cubbies.

“This is where the boxes are kept.” She pointed to the rows and rows of steel doors. “The vault is locked all hours except business hours. It’s monitored twenty-four hours a day with security cameras. Your valuables will be more than safe here.”

Iris searched the corners for the security cameras until she saw three little red lights blinking along the ceiling.

“How are the boxes opened?”

“The bank will issue you two keys. You put one here.” She pointed to one of two keyholes in a door. “And then I put the bank’s key here. The two keys must be turned at the same time to open the box.”

Iris stared at the two keyholes. “What happens if someone steals my key?”

“Don’t worry. No one is allowed in the vault without presenting identification and signing a log. The thief would have to look exactly like you, have your photo ID, and forge your signature. It hasn’t happened once in the twenty-five years I’ve worked here,” she said with a reassuring smile. She led Iris back to her office and slid behind her computer screen.

Iris picked up the clipboard again and sat down. “What happens if I lose my keys?”

“If you lose both keys, the bank will have to drill the box open at your expense.”

“How much does that cost?”

“Oh, several hundred dollars.”

Iris nodded, then at the risk of sounding morbid asked, “What if I die?”

“You’ll find a section on the form where you can authorize next of kin to open the box with proper documentation. I suggest you keep a copy of your will outside the box to avoid a loss.”

“What if I forget to pay the rent on the box?”

Annoyance began to register on the woman’s face. “By law, we are required to retain the box for five years. At that time, your possessions will be transferred to the State of Ohio. Valuable objects will be auctioned, and the proceeds will be kept in the state treasury under your name.”

Still Iris pressed on. “What if someone at the bank wanted to steal something in my box. Can the box be opened by someone here without me knowing?”

The woman gaped at Iris like she’d just suggested the bank was molesting small children. “The keys are kept secure by bank employees.”

“Right. But how many bank keys are there?” Iris eyed the elastic key ring strangling the woman’s wrist.

“Every vault has a slightly different system. At our bank, we have fifteen keys that open the safe deposit boxes. I assure you that only the people with the proper training and security clearance have access to the keys.” The woman announced her irritation as she straightened a stack of forms by loudly pounding them on the desktop.

“Well, what if a janitor or someone found your keys, like, in the bathroom? Wouldn’t he be able to open the boxes?”

“Miss, the keys are encoded to only open certain boxes. A janitor wouldn’t know which to use. Besides, no one can open your box without your key.” She sighed. “Obviously, you have some serious reservations about banking with us. I suggest you do some more research on your own before opening an account.”

“Perhaps you’re right.” Iris pulled the form off the clipboard and placed it into her purse, then stood to leave. “I’ll give it some more thought and come back another day.”

The clerk nodded and began clicking her keyboard loudly.

Iris paused before finally asking the question that led her down to the Safe Deposits Office in the first place. “Isn’t there like a master key somewhere? I heard sometimes the banks keep a master key.”

“Where on earth did you hear that?” the woman asked, dropping her hand onto the desk with a thud. “We don’t keep dead keys anymore. They’re a violation of FDIC policy.”

“Dead keys?”

“I’m sorry, but this is really not appropriate.” The woman shook her head.

“Why do they call them dead keys?” Iris pressed.

“When a box goes dormant for many years, we say it died. When a box dies it needs to be cleaned out and repurposed for someone else. We used to open it with a dead key and then switch out the lock. Now we have to drill the casing open and replace the entire thing. It’s a huge waste of money if you ask me.”

“Do boxes die often?”

“You’d be shocked.”

CHAPTER 56

The boxes are dead. Iris repeated the phrase in her head, driving home from Akron. It had been twenty years since the First Bank of Cleveland closed. Anyone desperate for their belongings would have filed the paperwork and had their boxes drilled open by now. It had happened several times. She’d seen ten boxes that had been drilled open her first time in the vault. Ramone had said the last one was over ten years ago. The keys were lost. The vault was nothing but a tomb.

According to the Capital Bank clerk, people’s deposits were held for five years, but after that they were up for auction. Iris drove up I-77 and wondered whatever would possess someone to put their valuables in a strange vault in the first place. Whatever was deposited would have to be something someone needed to hide, she decided. She pulled off the highway and turned into her neighborhood. Maybe people wanted to leave their secrets buried. Maybe that was why so many boxes died.

But someone wanted back in. Perhaps the county’s plan to buy the building had leaked out, and someone figured this was their last chance. In the back of her mind, a dark figure in a blue shirt rushed away from the vault. Someone had been there that day. She pulled to the curb in front of her duplex. She reached into her purse and felt for the ring of keys she had found hanging from a safe deposit box door. There were twelve. These must be the bank keys to the deposit boxes, she figured, as she flipped through them one by one. The woman in Akron said there was a code to them—a trick to make it difficult. Each was marked with a letter that must mean something—”N,” “D,” “E,” “O.” They went in no discernible order, but a thief could just try each one until he found a match. There were only twelve. It would still take some time—maybe enough time to get caught. There were over a thousand boxes to open.