It was my older brother, Richard Vance.
Richard stopped dead in his tracks five feet away, his sharp blue eyes darting from me to the exposed Harley, then down to the canvas tarp crumpled on the floor, and finally settling on the small boy holding the open backpack.
"What the hell is going on back here, Sam?" Richard demanded, his voice instantly filling the room with the practiced authority of a town councilman. "Why is Earl's scrap heap uncovered? And who is this kid?"
CHAPTER 2
The silence that followed Richard’s voice was as tight as a overtightened head bolt ready to snap. The ambient sounds of the shop—the distant hum of the air compressor in the utility closet, the rhythmic drip of oil from an engine block on Lift Two—seemed to fade into the background.
Richard walked briskly toward us, his polished leather dress shoes clicking sharply against the oil-stained concrete. At fifty-nine, my brother looked like everything I wasn't. He was clean-shaven, impeccably groomed, wearing a silver watch that cost more than I made in a good month of transmission rebuilds. He was the golden boy of Blackwood—former town treasurer, current head of the township zoning board, and the man who held the master lease on Vance & Brennan Repair.
"I asked you a question, Sam," Richard said, stopping right beside the rear fender of the Harley. He didn't look directly at Toby, but his eyes narrowed as he took in the boy's oversized denim jacket and dirty hands. "You know township code strictures prohibit unregistered minor visitors in active workspace bays. If the insurance inspector walked in right now, we’d face a five-hundred-dollar citation."
"He's not a visitor, Richard," I said. My voice sounded strange to my own ears—hollow, raspy, strained by the sudden lump in my throat. I stood up straight, placing myself physically between my brother and the eleven-year-old boy. "This is Earl's grandson. Toby."
Richard’s posture stiffened for a fraction of a second. His chin dipped down slightly, his hands sliding naturally into his suit pants pockets. It was a subtle physical shift, one most people wouldn't have noticed, but I had known Richard my whole life. It was the exact gesture he made whenever a county zoning audit didn't go his way.
"Earl's grandson?" Richard let out a short, dry laugh that carried zero humor. "Well, isn't that something. I didn't know Earl's daughter was still living in the county. Last I heard, she moved down to Harrisburg after Earl skipped town." He looked down at Toby, forcing a thin, practiced politician’s smile. "Son, if you're here looking for leftover auto parts or scrap iron, you're twenty years too late. Your grandfather cleaned this place out before you were even a thought."
"He didn't clean it out," Toby said plainly. He didn't flinch under Richard's towering gaze. He held his ground, his small hand gripping the strap of his canvas bag. "He left his tools."
Richard’s smile faltered. His eyes flicked down to the open oilcloth roll resting on the Harley seat, where the steel wrenches gleamed under the overhead work lights. His right hand twitched inside his pocket.
"Sam," Richard said, his tone dropping into that familiar, condescending register he used whenever he wanted to treat me like a younger brother who couldn't manage his own bank account. "Put the tarp back over the bike and send the boy home. We have a meeting with the township planning committee in twenty minutes. The developers from the Apex Industrial Group are signing the preliminary land option for the back three acres today. You need to sign the lease termination papers on Bay Three so we can clear the pad."
I looked at Richard, then down at the steel wrench stamped PROPERTY OF E.B.
"The kid says someone poured melted lead down the crankcase of Earl's engine," I said quietly.
Richard scoffed, shaking his head with exasperation. "What are you talking about? Sam, the engine seized because Earl ran it dry on the interstate while he was making his getaway with fifty thousand dollars of our operating capital. Sheriff Miller wrote the report twenty years ago. You were there when they towed it in from Route 9."
"Route 9?" Toby interrupted, his young voice cutting through Richard's slick delivery like a dull knife. "My granddad's truck was found by the river on Route 4. Why would his bike be on Route 9?"
Richard turned his full attention toward Toby now, his jaw clenching hard enough that the muscles along his cheekbone bulged under his smooth skin. "Listen to me, little boy. You don't know what you're talking about. You're repeating old town rumors your mother pulled out of thin air because she couldn't face the truth about her deadbeat father. Earl Brennan was a thief. He stole from my brother, he stole from this business, and he abandoned this town. Now take your bag and get out of this garage."
"Richard," I said, stepping directly into his line of sight. "Why does a hardware store receipt from August 14th, 2005, have your signature on it for three bags of concrete and a gallon of lead solder?"