Elm Street was only ten minutes away. It was an older part of town, mostly brick facades and fading awnings. The diner was a small, independent joint called Mabel’s. We pulled into the alley behind the kitchen, the tires of the flatbed crunching over loose gravel and broken glass.
The blue Honda Civic was tucked into the corner, parked crookedly next to a rusted dumpster. I stepped out of the truck and walked over to it.
The damage was obvious immediately. The front right bumper was crushed inward, the plastic cowling shattered, and the right headlight assembly was completely obliterated. There were deep scrapes along the passenger side doors, and a streak of yellow industrial paint smeared across the blue finish. It looked exactly like what Sam had described—someone backing up or turning too sharply into a concrete parking pillar.
“Looks like she panicked and scraped the hell out of a parking garage,” Bear said, walking up behind me with a clipboard and a set of slim jims. “Radiator is probably fine, but that tie rod might be bent. Easy fix. We can hammer out the bumper, replace the light, give it a quick buffer, and have it looking decent by tomorrow morning.”
“Yeah,” I murmured, crouching down near the front right tire.
Something bothered me. The angle of the impact was strange. The wheel rim was heavily gouged, meaning she had hit the pillar with significant speed. But if she was just pulling out of a parking spot, why was she moving fast enough to crush the quarter panel?
I pulled a small penlight from my chest pocket and leaned closer, shining the beam through the spokes of the damaged wheel. I was looking for structural damage to the axle. Instead, my light caught something dripping steadily onto the asphalt.
A dark, slick puddle was pooling near the inside of the tire.
I reached out, swiping my fingers through the fluid. I rubbed it between my thumb and index finger, then brought it to my nose. It wasn’t motor oil. It wasn’t transmission fluid. It was brake fluid.
I lay down on my back on the filthy alley floor and shimmied under the front of the car. The smell of leaking fluids was overwhelming. I pointed my flashlight upward, tracing the line from the master cylinder down toward the right front caliper.
My breath caught in my throat.
The flexible rubber brake hose wasn’t ruptured from the impact. It wasn’t worn out. It was sliced. The cut was incredibly clean, a perfectly straight line made by a sharp blade, severing the line completely.
“Bear,” I said, my voice tight.
“What is it?” he asked, stepping closer to the car.
“Someone cut the brake lines,” I said, sliding out from under the chassis and standing up, wiping the dirt off my back. “They didn’t do it to scare her. They cut the main line. She didn’t just scrape a pillar. She tried to stop, realized she had no brakes, and intentionally slammed the side of the car into something to bring it to a halt before she rolled out into traffic.”
Bear’s expression darkened. He looked at the crushed front end, then down at the puddle of fluid. “Sam’s stepdad.”
“He goes on a business trip,” I said, piecing it together. “But before he leaves, he crawls under here with a razor blade. He knows she takes the highway to work. He wanted her to die on the interstate.”
Before Bear could respond, a muffled sound caught our attention. It was a digital trill, repeating every few seconds. It was coming from inside the locked Honda.
I walked around to the driver’s side window and peered through the glass. The car was a mess inside—fast food wrappers, empty coffee cups, and a child’s jacket thrown on the backseat. The sound was coming from the center console.
“Pop it,” I told Bear.
Bear slid a metal slim jim down the window weatherstripping. With a practiced twist of his wrist, the lock clicked, and he pulled the door open. The smell of stale perfume and old upholstery wafted out. I leaned across the driver’s seat and popped open the center console lid.
There was a cheap black burner phone sitting inside, vibrating against the plastic.
I picked it up. The screen was cracked, but the caller ID was clearly legible. It didn't show a phone number. It just showed a name, saved in all capital letters.
RICHARD.
My thumb hovered over the accept button. If I answered it, he would know someone else had the car. If I ignored it, he might realize his trap had failed. I stared at the flashing name, the reality of the situation settling heavy on my shoulders. We weren’t just fixing a dent to save a kid from a beating. We had just inserted ourselves into the middle of a murder plot.
I didn't press the button. I let it ring. I backed out of the car, looking down the empty alley. The shadows were growing longer, stretching across the gravel.
“Hook it up,” I told Bear, my voice grim. “Get it on the flatbed right now. We need to get back to the shop.”
CHAPTER 2