Chapter 13 - The Fire Behind the Kitchen Wall
I was already moving before Naomi finished reading the alert over my shoulder.
"Call 911," she said.
I did.
The dispatcher kept me on the line while we ran toward the parking garage.
I gave the farmhouse address.
I gave the security code.
I gave the gate description.
Then the second camera sent a notification.
MOTION DETECTED - SIDE YARD.
I opened the clip.
A shadow moved past the east wall.
The image froze.
Then the camera went offline too.
"Both feeds are dead," I said.
Naomi started the car.
"Fire department is closer than we are."
"Drive."
She did.
The trip normally took twenty minutes.
It felt like two hours.
I watched the phone the entire way.
No more alerts.
No restored feed.
Nothing.
When we turned onto the farm road, I saw smoke before I saw the house.
Not a towering column.
A dark smear pushing through the trees.
Two fire engines blocked the driveway.
A deputy waved us back.
I got out anyway.
"Ma'am, stay behind the truck."
"I own the property."
He looked at my face and stopped arguing.
The fire had started at the rear of the house.
Flames had already been knocked down.
White smoke rolled through an upstairs window.
Water poured off the porch roof.
The kitchen door hung open.
A firefighter came out carrying a blackened section of baseboard.
My chest hurt.
Not from smoke.
From memory.
Granddad teaching me to sand the porch railing.
Granddad letting me hammer nails badly because he said straight nails were learned, not inherited.
Granddad telling me every board had a story.
Someone had tried to turn those boards into ash.
Naomi stood beside me.
"The documents are safe."
I knew what she was doing.
Giving me the fact I could hold.
The trust deed was safe.
The 2009 affidavit was safe.
Granddad's letter was safe.
Nothing essential to the case had been inside.
That did not stop the anger.
Deputy Ellis arrived ten minutes later.
He recognized me immediately.
"You again."
"Apparently."
His expression turned serious.
"Fire investigator is on the way."
"Someone carried a fuel can onto the property."
"We got that from dispatch."
"The cameras went offline right after."
"Can your system recover cloud clips?"
"Yes."
"Don't open anything else."
I handed him my phone.
By late afternoon, the fire marshal had a preliminary opinion.
The fire was intentionally set in the back utility room.
An accelerant had been poured along the floor near the electrical panel.
The person had apparently expected the fire to climb inside the wall and reach the second floor.
It nearly had.
A neighbor saw smoke early and called the fire department.
Another ten minutes might have destroyed the entire house.
"Any sign of forced entry?" Naomi asked.
The investigator shook his head.
"Rear door lock was opened cleanly."
A key again.
I looked at Deputy Ellis.
"Dad and Ryan both had old keys."
"You changed the locks."
"Yes."
"Then either someone got a new key, picked it, or entered another way and unlocked the door from inside."
The locksmith had installed high-security cylinders two days earlier.
Picking them was possible.
Casual access was not.
Ellis looked toward the side yard.
"We found something else."
He led us around the house.
Near the tree line was a fresh tire rut.
Pressed into the soft earth beside it was a torn strip of magnetic vehicle signage.
Only part of the lettering remained.
POINT TITLE.
Naomi looked at me.
Harbor Point Title Services.
Derek.
"Could be planted," she said immediately.
Ellis nodded.
"Could be."
That was why I liked him.
He never confused the first explanation with the correct one.
The fire investigator bagged the fragment.
At five fifteen, Naomi received a call from Derek's attorney.
She listened for less than a minute.
"Yes," she said.
"Tomorrow morning works."
She hung up.
"Derek wants to talk before his deposition."
I looked at the burned kitchen wall.
"Now?"
"Apparently the fire changed his risk calculation."
"Does he think Dad did it?"
"His attorney didn't say."
That night, I stayed at the farmhouse until the windows were boarded and the utility power was shut off.
The first floor smelled of wet plaster, smoke, and old wood.
The kitchen ceiling had partially collapsed.
The pencil marks on the doorway were still there.
Ryan's height at fifteen.
Mine at seventeen.
A stream of dirty water ran beneath them.
I touched the wall.
For the first time since the lawsuit began, I understood that the house was not just evidence anymore.
It was a target.
At seven the next morning, Derek arrived at Naomi's office with two lawyers.
He looked like he had not slept.
Before sitting down, he placed his phone on the table.
Then he placed a key beside it.
I recognized the key immediately.
It was one of the new farmhouse keys.
My body went still.
"Where did you get that?"
Derek raised both hands.
"Not from the fire."
Naomi's voice sharpened.
"Answer her question."
Derek looked at me.
"Ryan gave it to me yesterday morning."
My stomach dropped.
"Why?"
"He said your father wanted something from the house before today's hearing."
"What?"
"A ledger."
I thought of the empty space beneath my childhood floorboard.
"Did you go there?"
"No."
"Then why do you have the key?"
"Because Ryan put it in my mailbox with a note."
"Where's the note?"
Derek slid a folded paper across the table.
Naomi opened it.
The handwriting was Ryan's.
Find the green ledger before Dad does.
If Evelyn has it, we're all finished.
I read the sentence slowly.
"What green ledger?"
Derek looked toward his attorneys.
One of them nodded.
Derek swallowed.
"The one your grandfather kept on Robert."
"Kept what?"
"Every loan."
"Every forged signature."
"Every time money disappeared from the shop."
I stared at him.
"You said every time."
May you like
Derek looked down.
"2009 wasn't the first one."
