Set in the industrial area of Chestnut Hill in Tamarack County, Minnesota, the storage locker facility looked old and run down.
"Don't go into the lockers themselves," Pete, the locksmith, had guided her. "If I recall, this safe was in the basement area of the storage facility, with a lot of junk around it. It was used by the owner twenty years ago, but the last time I spoke to him, he said he was going to rent it out, with the units, as he was selling the business."
Breathing in the cool, early morning air as she hurried to the facility's main entrance, May felt grateful for the locksmith's clear memories of these old-fashioned and uncommon safes. Without his personal recollection of this safe, she would never have known where to find it.
The early morning breeze ruffled her sandy-blond hair as she rushed to the entrance. She was already in her work uniform. She was going straight from here, to the police department in nearby Fairshore, to start her working day.
But first, May felt breathless with hope that she might learn more clues about her sister Lauren's disappearance ten years ago.
Her eighteen-year-old sister had last been seen storming out of the house after a fight with May. She'd taken the trail down to the lake. Someone had been watching and videoing her. This anonymous someone had recently warned May to back off of reinvestigating the case and had broken into her house and left the video on her laptop as a threat.
But May had now found the two keys needed for access to this safe. One had been in Lauren's evidence box: a surprise item, undocumented and unrecorded. And the other had been found on the site of the old mill a couple of blocks away, where May realized that Lauren's watcher had been waiting.
The old mill was high-lying and the area where she'd found the key had given a good view of the surrounding neighborhood, which included her parents' house. May wondered if this anonymous criminal had made the mill his lookout point and had stood there waiting to spy on other women and film his videos.
She hoped that with both keys in her possession, she would get answers.
She hurried into the building. At six-thirty a.m., it had just opened its doors for the day. A tired-looking attendant in her late-forties was sitting behind the battered wooden counter.
"Help you?" she asked, slurping on a large cup of coffee.
"I'm here to get into a safe in the basement." May smiled at her, hoping she could win this woman over, because all she had were the keys. She had no other proof that she was entitled to access this safe and was anticipating there might be a problem.
Sure enough, the woman seemed unmoved by May's hopeful smile.
"Where's your proof of payment?" she questioned.
"Sorry?" May asked, frowning.
"Your proof of payment. Nobody's allowed to access anything here unless the rental is paid up to date."
May's eyes widened. This was something she had not expected, although now she thought about it, it did seem logical.
But it was a huge stumbling block. Who had been paying for the rental of this safe for the past ten years or more? She strongly guessed that nobody had, that there would be no record of payment, but it was worth finding out. What if this gave her a lead about who had put the items in there?
"What's the last record of payment you have for this safe?" she said, passing over the dimensions and model number that the locksmith had provided.
The woman peered at it, consulted her list, then shrugged, frowning, causing the lines in her dull-skinned forehead to deepen. "That one was rented out before my time. The current owner bought the business seven years ago, and the old owner never gave us some of the information he was supposed to before he retired out of state."
"That's so?" May asked, feeling worried.
"The only way we have of tracing some lockers and safes is when the owners come in wanting to open them. So, where is your payment?" she asked, now with a challenge in her voice.
May shook her head. She wasn't the authorized owner. She couldn't produce proof of payment and was pretty sure that seven years' worth of monthly rental payments would add up to more than she could afford in any case.
"It's police business," she said, showing the woman her badge. "This key was found in an evidence box when we opened a cold case."
She wasn't going to mention where the other key was found, deciding to focus on the evidence box.
"It was?" Now the attendant seemed more uncertain, and May pushed for the advantage.
"You'd be assisting in a missing person case if you allowed me to open this safe," she said. "We're always grateful for help from the public when we work on cases. This is a cold case, going back years, and the family is desperate for answers.”
The family, in this particular instance, was May herself, her parents, and her older sister Kerry. Even though her parents seldom mentioned Lauren, May remembered how much anguish her sister’s disappearance had caused in their lives, and how the pain of not knowing was with them every day, just as it was with her.
“But if those are the rules, I can come back with a warrant, or even a subpoena if we have to. That will just mean more time wasted on your side,” May wrapped up an argument she hoped would be effective.
The woman looked dubious. She glanced down at her phone and magazine. May had correctly sensed that the thought of this extra effort and disruption to her routine would persuade her to relent.
"I'll need you to write your reasons in the book and give me your details. I don't want trouble from the owner," she said eventually, pushing a battered logbook over to May.
"Sure," May smiled. "Thank you."
She took one of her business cards out, handed it over, and scribbled a quick, concise explanation in the logbook.
"I guess you can go down." The woman indicated the stairs behind her. "There are a few safes down there. The one you need is at the very back, on the left."
"Thank you," May said gratefully.
Now that she was actually ready to head down those gloomy stairs, she felt surprisingly nervous. What would she find when she opened that safe? Whatever was in there had clearly been there, undisturbed, for more than seven years. Perhaps longer.
May wondered why this was so. Her spine prickled as she considered the possibilities. Was Lauren's captor laying low? Had he ever intended to try and open this safe again? Did he have spare keys, or had he lost both these keys?
Was this person even still alive?
And of course, the question she could never help but ask herself — was Lauren still alive? Could she possibly still be somewhere, held captive and locked away, just like the hidden contents of the safe?
May reached the stairs and walked down, smelling damp and dust, hearing a faint scuttle from the darkest corner as she descended deep into the dimly lit basement.
Down here, she felt determined she would find answers. For herself, her parents, and her older sister Kerry, she was going to learn what had happened to Lauren — who had taken her, and why she'd disappeared without a trace that terrible day.
There was the safe, on the left, at the end of the row, its hulking metal shape visible in the semi-darkness. It looked heavy and solid, and May could see a layer of dust, making the steel on its roof look dull.
Holding both the keys in fingers that felt cold with nerves and expectation, she approached it.