And now?
Now I called Petey Anselmo — you remember Petey, he did the books for half the county before he retired. Petey pulled the old records. Ray paused, and Jack could hear papers rustling on the other end of the line. "The building was owned by a shell company out of Delaware. But the insurance claim — the big one, the one that paid out after the fire — that went through fast. Suspiciously fast, Petey says. Total loss, maximum payout, check cut in eleven weeks."
Jack stopped cleaning the carburetor part. He remembered Petey Anselmo from the funeral — a small, precise man who had cried quietly through the whole service.
Who benefits from a fast payout? Cole asked.
That's the question, isn't it? Another pause, longer this time. "Petey remembers the adjuster. Young guy, eager, new to the territory. And Petey says — and I'm quoting Petey here, so take it for what it's worth — the kid had a 'facilitator.' Somebody who brought the owner and the adjuster together, somebody who put up his own cash money to make the whole thing move. Twenty thousand, Petey heard. To the owner. To look the other way for one night and sign the papers after."
What kind of money?
Twenty thousand. Cash. And the building was insured for more than it was worth — that's why the shell company bought it. You burn it down, you collect more than you paid. Oldest game there is.
Jack set the carburetor part down very carefully on the workbench. His hands had gone still, and he realized he was holding his breath.
Who? Cole asked.
Victor Larkin.
The name landed in the workshop like a dropped wrench.
Jack knew that name. Everybody in the Iron Wolves knew that name, the way families know the name of the uncle nobody invites to Thanksgiving anymore. Victor "Vic" Larkin — club treasurer nine years ago, caught skimming from the charity fund, expelled in a vote Jack's father had nothing to do with but everybody remembered. Expelled, Ray had told him once, the same winter as the fire. Weeks before, maybe. The timing had never seemed important.
It seemed important now.
Ray was quiet for a moment, and Jack could hear him breathing on the other end of the line — slow, measured, the way the old biker breathed when he was deciding how much of a memory to open.
I remember the vote, Ray said finally. "Nine years ago, February. We're packed into the old clubhouse on Mill Street. Cole reads the numbers — the charity fund, short three thousand dollars, receipts don't add up, Larkin's the only one with the books. Larkin says it's a mistake. Cole says, 'Then show us the mistake, Vic.' And Larkin just smiled. Like we were the ones who didn't understand how the world worked."
What happened? Jack asked, though he already knew.
We voted. Twenty-one to three to expel him. He stood up, took his patch off, laid it on the table very carefully, and said, 'You'll be sorry you did this.' Not loud. Just — certain. Like he was telling us the weather. Ray exhaled. "Three weeks later, the warehouse burned."
The workshop was silent except for the hum of the fluorescent lights. Jack thought about a man laying his patch on a table very carefully, and then smiling, and then saying *you'll be sorry* — and he thought about his father's journal, about six words underlined twice, and the two things fit together in his mind with a click he felt in his teeth.
Larkin put up money for an insurance fire on a building he didn't own? Cole said slowly. "Why?"
Revenge, Ray said. "That's what Petey thinks. Twenty grand of his own money, to hurt us and let the owner collect. Petey heard the owner walked away clean."
Cole was quiet for a long moment. Then: "Where's Larkin now?"
That's the second thing. Ray's voice had changed — Jack recognized the tone from the kitchen table, the tone of a man who has found the second half of something terrible. "I asked around. You know that distributor Delaney's gets his kits from? Tri-State Parts Distribution, over on the industrial parkway?"
Yeah.
One of our prospects has a cousin on Tri-State's loading dock. I bought the kid coffee and asked who runs the shipping floor. A beat. "Shift supervisor. Been there eight years. Name's Victor Larkin."
Jack didn't need to guess. He could see it in Cole's face before Ray said the name out loud — the way the color left Cole Mercer's cheeks, the way his jaw set, the way his hand tightened on the phone until his knuckles went white.
Victor Larkin, Ray said.
That night, Jack came home with grease so deep under his fingernails that no amount of scrubbing would get it all out, and his mother took one look at him in the doorway and started laughing — and then stopped laughing, because she saw his face.
What happened? she asked.
Jack told her about Larkin, about the insurance, about Tri-State, about nine years — leaving out the parts that would keep her up at night, the way his father used to leave out the worst calls.
Melissa listened the way she always listened, completely still, her hands folded on the table. When he finished, she was quiet for a long time.
Your father used to say, she said finally, "that the most dangerous fires are the ones that smolder. The ones you think are out." She reached across the table and took Jack's grimy hand in both of hers, not caring about the grease. "Be careful, baby. Smoldering things have a way of flaring up when you start poking at them."
I know, Mom.
Do you? Her eyes were bright. "Because you're seventeen, and you're brave the way he was brave."
Jack squeezed her hand. "I'll look low," he said. "Promise."
She ruffled his hair like he was eight years old and told him to go shower before he got grease on her clean kitchen.
Two threads. One man.