Chapter 8
Manny’s finger stayed on the handwritten note.
“That’s the part they cut away,” he’d said. The words sat between us on the folded repair copy, and the garage seemed to have gone quiet around them.
“Who handled it?” I asked.
Manny rubbed the heel of his hand over his mouth. His eyes flicked to the service entrance, then back to me.
“A contractor. Elias Rook. He came after hours with a tow rig and took the old steering assembly. Said he was moving it for safekeeping.”
“Did you believe him?”
“No. But I believed the men who sent him could make trouble for my family.”
He dug into the pocket of his coveralls and drew out a brittle carbon slip. It listed a storage facility on Bellwether’s industrial edge, a unit number, and a monthly charge billed to an Oakridge vendor account. The account name belonged to a company that had been shut down years ago.
“How long have you had this?”
“Long enough to know I should’ve thrown it away.” Manny’s fingers tightened around the paper before he handed it to me. “I didn’t.”
I took a picture and sent it to Darlene. No message, just the receipt. She called less than a minute later.
“Don’t use the company system,” she said.
“I wasn’t going to.”
“I’m on my way.”
Manny stared at the phone after I ended the call. “You’re taking her to the place?”
“I’m taking the receipt to her. She decides what she wants to do.”
“That’s a clean answer.”
“It’s the one I’ve got.”
Darlene arrived twenty minutes later, stepping out of a dark sedan in a charcoal coat. She took one look at the carbon slip and scanned the vendor name with her phone, not opening Oakridge’s network.
“Closed account,” she said. “The storage charges were hidden under an inactive vendor profile.”
“Can you get us in?” I asked.
“I can establish that Oakridge paid for the unit. I can’t make a court order appear in my pocket.”
“Then we don’t pretend we have one.”
Her eyes held mine for a beat. “The facility manager has an emergency-contact number on the account. We’ll ask for access, and if he says no, we leave.”
It was not the answer I expected from the Iron Queen. Maybe she noticed.
“Your turn to be surprised,” she said.
The facility sat between a shuttered tire shop and a trucking depot, its rows of corrugated doors glowing dull orange under security lights. A camera watched the gate. Darlene used the emergency number on the account, spoke to a manager, and identified herself without raising her voice. Five minutes later, we were inside with a temporary access code and the manager’s warning not to remove anything.
Unit 214 stood at the end of the last row. Its padlock was newer than the rust around the latch. I touched it, then looked at Darlene.
“Still want to proceed?”
“Yes.”
She held out the phone, its flashlight on. Her hand trembled once before she steadied it.
I cut the lock with bolt cutters borrowed from the facility’s maintenance shed. The metal snapped, the sound sharp in the narrow corridor. Darlene pushed up the roll-up door, and a smell of old oil and damp cloth breathed out at us.
Inside, stacked tires and dented tool cabinets left only a narrow path to the back. I swept my flashlight over the floor. A hidden camera blinked from a shelf, aimed straight at the doorway.
“Somebody knew we’d come,” I said.
Darlene’s jaw hardened. “Or wanted us to think so.”
Behind the cabinets, a long shape lay beneath a shop cloth. I crouched and peeled the fabric back. A steel steering housing emerged, scored and blackened, its weight pulling at my arms when I lifted one end.
The repair copy in my pocket said the assembly had been replaced after the crash. This looked like the piece removed from the car. It didn’t tell me what had happened before the crash. It didn’t tell me who had ordered the work.
A folded note lay beneath the cloth.
KEEP OFF OFFICIAL LOGS. DO NOT ROUTE THROUGH SERVICE.
The handwriting was cramped, pressed hard into the paper. No name, no date.
Darlene leaned closer, then stopped herself short of touching it. “Photograph the position. Then the note.”
I took out my phone. The camera flash popped.
A metal crash rang behind us.
The roll-up door slammed shut.
I ran back and shoved both hands against it. It didn’t move. The latch had dropped from the outside.
“Darlene, get away from the door.”
She backed toward the center of the unit, one hand braced against a cabinet. I heard a starter grind somewhere beyond the wall, followed by the deep, steady rumble of an engine.
Then the smell reached us—hot exhaust, sharp enough to sting my eyes.
Gray fumes curled beneath the door, spreading low across the concrete.
Darlene pulled her coat over her mouth. “There has to be an alarm.”
I scanned the walls. No alarm, no window at eye level. A small pane sat high above the cabinets, barely visible in the dark.
“Can you get to the wall?” I asked.
“I can.”
Her voice was clipped, but she moved when I pointed. She took the cabinet for support and followed my lead, one measured step at a time. The steel housing was still in my hands, heavy enough to drag my arms down. I saw the strain in her face as she reached the wall and pressed her shoulder against it.
The engine outside revved once.
May you like
The fumes thickened. My throat tightened as I looked from the high window to the steel case. Darlene’s fingers slipped against the cabinet edge. Her knees began to buckle.
I raised the component over my head and swung at the glass.
