Chapter 4 - TWO DAYS BEFORE THE FIRE
The wedding was canceled at 4:22 p.m.
Not postponed.
Canceled.
Naomi called the venue coordinator herself.
“Tell everyone there has been a family emergency.”
It was not a lie.
Marcus stood twenty feet away while she did it.
He did not ask her to reconsider.
Good.
Then Naomi called her office.
That call hurt more.
Deputy Chief Prosecutor Dana Wells answered.
Naomi told her:
“I may have a previously undisclosed personal connection to an old case that overlaps our current stolen-vehicle prosecution.”
Dana went silent.
“What kind of connection?”
“I was unknowingly used as a courier to a confidential source six years ago.”
“How unknowingly?”
“I knew I was carrying something sealed. I didn’t know the recipient was a source.”
“Current overlap?”
“Renee Hayes says a VIN from that file appears in ours.”
“Do not open anything else.”
Naomi looked around the floor.
“Too late.”
“What?”
“Physical photographs just fell out of a motorcycle.”
Dana took one breath.
“Touch nothing else. Call local police and our Professional Integrity liaison.”
The garage became a scene.
Not a murder scene.
Not yet.
A potential evidence-provenance scene.
Venue security shut the entrance.
Wedding guests were kept outside.
Marcus’s family lawyer arrived.
So did an investigator from Naomi’s office who had never worked her current case.
Good.
Naomi surrendered the photograph she had touched.
Marcus surrendered the wedding ring.
The old motorcycle side case was photographed before anything else moved.
Thirty-seven photographs lay on the concrete.
Three more remained wedged inside the leather case.
One empty paper sleeve.
No film negatives.
No memory card.
Gloria sat beside her attorney.
Marcus sat on another bench.
Naomi stood because sitting made her feel trapped.
The independent investigator, Kara Mills, asked Gloria one question at a time.
“Were you in this garage two days before the fire?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“It was my family’s business.”
“Did you observe Naomi Carter?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know her name?”
“No.”
“Who told you later?”
“Warren Pike.”
Naomi looked up.
“When?”
“After Elias died.”
Gloria’s attorney touched her sleeve.
Gloria continued anyway.
“Pike came here the morning after the fire.”
Renee turned sharply.
“What?”
Gloria looked at her.
“You always suspected.”
“I never had proof.”
“He came before the second police search.”
Kara Mills asked:
“Was the building released?”
“No.”
“Then how did he enter?”
Gloria said nothing.
“Ms. Reed?”
“I let him in.”
Marcus closed his eyes.
Naomi looked at him.
“You knew.”
Marcus answered:
“Not that day.”
“When?”
“Later.”
Gloria looked furious.
“At me.”
Marcus turned toward her.
“You want me to keep doing this now?”
She looked away.
Marcus continued.
“I learned after the insurance interview.”
Kara Mills held up a hand.
“One person at a time.”
She returned to Gloria.
“Why did you let Pike into a restricted fire scene?”
“He said Elias had confidential-source materials that could get people killed if local police found them.”
Renee said:
“Which local police?”
“The same department Elias thought had a leak.”
That mattered.
Gloria continued.
“Pike said the task force hadn’t locked down all source material yet.”
“Did he show a warrant?”
“No.”
“Written authorization?”
“No.”
“Badge?”
“He was the prosecutor.”
The sentence explained too much.
“What did he remove?”
“A gray document box.”
“From where?”
“Under Elias’s workbench.”
“Anything from the motorcycle?”
Gloria looked at the Indian.
“I thought so.”
Naomi caught it.
“Thought?”
“Pike opened the side case.”
“Did you see him remove photographs?”
“He had papers in his hand when he closed it.”
“Did you see what they were?”
“No.”
Then Naomi asked:
“Why lie afterward?”
Her own voice sounded colder than she expected.
Kara Mills looked at her.
“Naomi.”
Right.
Not her interview.
Naomi stepped back.
Kara asked instead.
“Did you tell fire investigators Pike entered?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“He said disclosing it would identify Elias as a source.”
“Did that concern you?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
Gloria hesitated.
Then:
“The insurance company asked whether anyone entered before the supplemental inspection.”
“And?”
“I said no.”
“Why?”
“The property claim was already being challenged because Elias had stored unauthorized customer motorcycles here.”
Money.
Not the only reason.
Still real.
If the insurer denied the fire claim, Reed Cycle Works would collapse.
Gloria had already lost one son.
She did not want to lose the family business.
Then Marcus spoke from across the room.
“I signed the same statement.”
Naomi turned.
His face had gone hard.
“At the time I knew Pike had entered.”
Gloria stared at him.
Marcus continued.
“Mom told me after the first interview because she was afraid the insurance lawyer would ask me separately.”
Kara Mills asked:
“And you signed anyway?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Marcus looked toward Naomi.
“Because the shop was underwater.”
No elaborate excuse.
“Dad had died. Elias was dead. Mom had liens. If the carrier denied the structural claim, she lost everything.”
“So you knowingly affirmed no one had entered when you knew Pike had?”
“Yes.”
Naomi stared at him.
This was not six-year-old secret confusion anymore.
This was a choice.
Marcus’s choice.
Then Kara Mills looked toward the black Indian.
“Did either of you search that side case afterward?”
Gloria answered:
“No.”
Marcus:
“No.”
“Why not?”
Gloria looked at the motorcycle.
“Because the police sealed it.”
“For how long?”
“Eleven months.”
“And after?”
Marcus took over.
“I picked it up from property.”
“Did you inspect it?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t want Elias’s things.”
There.
A human reason.
Also a terrible one now.
The motorcycle sat in storage for years.
Marcus finally restored the engine but left the original leather side case untouched because it still smelled faintly like the old shop.
Two months ago he moved the motorcycle here for wedding photographs.
He signed a venue inventory declaration:
No hazardous, restricted, stolen, evidentiary or confidential material contained in displayed vehicles.
Kara asked:
“Did you verify?”
Marcus looked down.
“No.”
Another signature.
Another convenient assumption.
Then one of the evidence technicians raised a hand.
“Investigator Mills.”
Everyone looked.
She held one photograph beneath a protective sleeve.
It showed Gloria.
Warren Pike.
And Elias.
Standing beside the black Indian.
Pike held the same sealed envelope Naomi had delivered.
May you like
On the back, handwritten:
THURSDAY — IF THIS GOES WRONG, ASK WHY HE SENT HER.
