Chapter 4
Curtis got me access to the fleet system before the end of my shift. “Read-only,” he said, tapping the temporary badge clipped to my belt. “You can see what’s logged. You can’t change anything.”
“I’ve spent years cleaning up after people who change things,” I said. “Read-only sounds like a promotion.”
He didn’t laugh. Maybe he’d noticed how the executives watched Darlene after Grant’s little speech. Maybe none of us had much room left for jokes.
The fleet record took three searches to find. The sedan’s plate matched an Oakridge vehicle listed as out of service after Darlene’s crash. Its status showed RETIRED. Then, several days later, a maintenance entry appeared beneath it.
The car had gone back into the garage.
I read the line twice, waiting for the dates to rearrange themselves into something harmless. They didn’t. The repair entry was brief, its description blank, and the authorizing field showed only an internal department code.
I printed nothing. I took a picture of the screen with my work phone, then stared at the empty description until the words looked less like a record and more like a door somebody had shut.
The garage smelled of rubber, metal shavings, and old coffee. I found the mechanic listed on the entry near a lift, his gray hair tucked beneath a cap, one hand black with grease.
“Do you remember this car?” I asked, showing him the plate number on my phone.
He glanced at it, then past my shoulder.
A woman in a charcoal suit stood near the service counter, speaking into her phone. I’d seen her with Grant at Oakridge. She wasn’t looking at us, exactly, but her attention held the room like a hand on the back of my neck.
“Can’t help you,” the mechanic said.
“It’s in the system under your name.”
“I said I can’t help you.”
He went back to the engine he was working on. The assistant ended her call and looked my way.
I put my phone away. “Understood.”
The assistant didn’t move. I walked out through the service bay, feeling her eyes follow me all the way to the corridor.
For the next few hours, I did the work I was supposed to do. I stayed close enough to Darlene to see who approached her, far enough away to avoid making her look like she needed a bodyguard. The distinction was thinner than it sounded. When she crossed the executive floor, people stepped aside before she reached them.
At six, she dismissed me with a clipped, “Go home.”
I told myself I was obeying when I went back to the garage after the assistant left. The mechanic was still there, locking a tool cabinet. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, bleaching the color from his face.
He saw me and swore under his breath.
“I’m not asking you to lie,” I said. “I’m asking what happened to a car the company says was retired.”
He kept one hand on the cabinet key. “You don’t understand what you’re asking.”
“I understand a car showed up outside my building. I understand someone photographed my daughter. I’m trying to find out whether those things are connected.”
His expression shifted at Abigail’s name. Not surprise. Something closer to shame.
He unlocked the cabinet, then locked it again without taking anything out. “The sedan came back here after the crash. Quietly. Not through the regular service schedule.”
“What did you repair?”
“I don’t know what you think I can tell you.”
“I think you can tell me why there’s a repair entry with no description.”
“I can tell you the original work order disappeared.” His voice dropped. “That’s all.”
Footsteps sounded in the hallway.
The mechanic stiffened. I turned. Darlene stood just inside the garage entrance, one hand gripping the doorframe. Her other arm hung carefully against her side. Her face was controlled, but her breath came shallow.
“You’re supposed to be on my detail,” she said.
“I was.”
“Were you?”
The mechanic took a step back toward the tool bench. I could feel the accusation settle between us—not just that I’d left my post, but that I’d chosen a piece of machinery and a frightened stranger over the person I’d agreed to protect.
“I found a post-crash repair in the fleet system,” I said. “The mechanic confirmed the car came back here.”
“Without telling me.”
“You were in a meeting.”
“That is not the same as being unavailable.”
She said it sharply, then pressed her lips together as if the words had cost her something. Her fingers tightened on the doorframe.
“I wasn’t trying to keep you in the dark,” I said. “I was trying to verify something before I brought you another suspicion.”
“And if someone catches you searching company records and wandering into a garage after hours?”
“Then they already have.”
“That is not clever, Blake. It gives Grant a reason to call this reckless—your appointment, my judgment, all of it.” Her voice hardened. “You were brought in to help protect me, not to chase every shadow you see.”
“Someone used a company car to watch my apartment and Abigail’s route. That isn’t a shadow.”
For one moment, her composure faltered. The anger stayed, but beneath it I saw the fear she didn’t want anyone else to find: fear that every person she let near her would become another liability, another name Grant could use against her.
“I don’t need you making yourself a target,” she said.
“I didn’t ask you to decide what risks I’m allowed to take.”
Her eyes sharpened. “You think I’m trying to control you?”
“I think you’re used to making the choice before anyone can leave it to you.”
The silence after that was louder than the lights.
The mechanic lowered his gaze. Darlene’s grip eased on the frame, though she didn’t look away from me.
“You could have told me,” she said.
“I could have.”
The words weren’t an apology. They weren’t a promise to obey next time, either. She seemed to hear the difference.
From the hallway came the measured click of heels.
The mechanic turned toward the sound, then caught my hand as if to steady himself. Something thin and torn slid against my palm. I curled my fingers around it.
May you like
The assistant appeared in the doorway.
Her eyes moved from Darlene to the mechanic, then settled on my closed fist.
