Twin halogen beams swept the frosted windows, casting shadows across the rafters as a commercial diesel backed up to Bay 2. I ducked behind the Civic, killed my torch, and tucked the ledger inside my jacket.
The truck idled down, its air brakes releasing with a hiss. Chains clinked against steel. Through the panel gap, I saw Deputy Miller driving County Wrecker 7—the heavy flatbed used for clearing wrecked haulers.
Miller unlocked the door with trembling hands, hauling the chain hoist until the panel rattled open, letting in cold rain and exhaust.
"Miller," Vance’s voice barked through the wrecker’s radio, the squelch breaking loud in the valley quiet. "Report."
Miller scrambled to the cab, keyed the microphone, and answered, "I'm at the pump house now, Sheriff. Just opened the bay."
"Hook the Civic from the rear axle," Vance ordered. "Use safety chains so you don't leave winch scores on the frame. Drive straight to the bridge on Route 9. The river is running four thousand cubic feet per second. Roll it into the deep channel below the pier, and leave the driver door unlatched."
"Sheriff," Miller stammered. "Arthur saw the toll log. What if he calls the state troop in Oakhaven?"
"Arthur has an empty envelope and a torn wire," Vance replied coldly. "By the time he finds an outside line, the Civic will be sixty feet under river silt with the samples inside. Nobody investigates a drowned auditor once the car is found. Get it in the water before midnight."
The radio clicked dead. Miller dropped the microphone and walked back into the bay, dragging two heavy transport chains across the concrete.
I stepped out from behind the salt spreader into the glare, holding Claire's open audit ledger in my left hand and a sixteen-inch steel tire iron in my right.
Miller dropped the chains with a clatter, stumbling back against the wrecker’s rear tire. His hand slapped his hip, but his gun belt lay on the cab's passenger seat.
"Don't move, Miller," I said. "Look at the yellow push-bumper paint embedded in my sister's crumpled fender."
Miller stared at me, his chest heaving, his face pale as chalk under the halogen lamps. "Arthur... you shouldn't be here. You need to walk away."
"You forced her into the ditch at 3:14 Wednesday morning," I said, stepping closer. "She didn't drown. And this ledger proves Vance took kickbacks to dump toxic solvent into the municipal aquifer."
Miller sank against the wrecker's mudflap, sliding down until his boots hit the floor. "I didn't want any part of this, Arthur. Harlan told me she was going to bankrupt the county. He said the state would revoke our charter."
"Where is she, Miller?" I asked, gripping the tire iron. "Her phone rang in the holding cell thirty minutes ago. Where is Claire?"
Miller buried his face in his trembling hands. "She's still back there," he whispered. "Cell 3. In the condemned wing behind the fire door. Harlan locked her in the dark Tuesday night to stop her audit. He took her badge and keys. He told me he was going to stage the recovery tonight, then force her across the state line to sign an affidavit saying she panicked and ran."
"He lied to you," I said. "Vance isn't letting an auditor walk out of that cell after her car turns up at the bottom of the river. Once that Civic is under sixty feet of silt, Claire doesn't leave that basement alive."
Miller looked up, horror washing the last defenses from his eyes. "He took the cell master keys from the desk. He told me to stay here until the wrecker was loaded."
"Give me the truck keys, Miller," I commanded.
Miller pulled the ignition ring from his jacket and dropped it into my palm. "Arthur, Harlan is alone at the station right now. If he realizes the wrecker isn't rolling by eleven, he'll know something broke. You can't take him head-on."
"I don't need to take him head-on," I said. "I have my sister's ledger, and I know exactly which door he's standing behind."
I wrapped transport chains through the wrecker's axle and padlock-clamped them around a steel building column, immobilizing the rig. I shoved Miller into the auxiliary office, threw the heavy deadbolt, and pocketed the key with the phone line severed.
I ran into the cold rain, climbed into my transit truck, and slammed the door. The dashboard clock read 10:48 PM. State Police headquarters in Oakhaven was forty minutes north—too far to save Claire before Vance acted. Blackwood Substation was eight miles south.
I shoved the transmission into gear, spun the truck around in the mud, and drove south into the dark.
CHAPTER 3: The Locked Wing Where Proof Survived
I thumbed the hands-free dial on the dashboard console while the transit truck crested the south ridge of Route 9, rain lashing the windshield in sheets that nearly drowned out the wipers. The call connected to the State Police regional communications post in Oakhaven on the third ring.