Chapter 6 - THE SHOP WE LEFT BEHINDMy father’s repair shop sat two miles outside Lebanon on a county road that most GPS systems barely recognized.
YATES DIESEL & FARM REPAIR.
Half the letters had fallen from the sign.
The building had not changed much since 1995.
Gray cinder block.
Rusting metal roof.
Two service bays.
Weeds growing through cracks in the parking lot.
I had kept paying taxes on the property for one reason.
I could never bring myself to sell the place where I learned everything that mattered.
How to rebuild an engine.
How to recognize a liar.
How to work when tired.
How to shake a man’s hand and mean it.
My father died inside Bay Two from a heart attack.
After that, I stopped going.
Daniel had remembered.
So had Evelyn.
Marcus drove.
Agent Chen followed in another SUV with two federal agents.
Wyatt remained in the hospital recovering from the first of what doctors warned could be several surgeries.
He had asked me not to go alone.
“You’re sixty-eight, Dad.”
“And?”
“You think that wrench you picked up last night makes you Batman?”
I laughed for the first time since finding him.
“No.”
“Good. Batman has better knees.”
That was Wyatt.
Broken, drugged, betrayed by his own wife, and still trying to make me laugh.
At the repair shop, Marcus checked the perimeter before opening the side door.
Dust rolled through the sunlight.
The smell hit me immediately.
Old oil.
Rubber.
Metal.
For a few seconds, I was twenty-three again.
Dad was yelling because Daniel misplaced a socket.
Evelyn was sitting on an overturned bucket bringing me a sandwich.
Our first truck was parked outside with a transmission that leaked more fluid than it held.
Back then we had nothing.
I had never been happier.
Agent Chen walked beside me.
“What exactly are we looking for?”
“I don’t know.”
“The place you stopped looking.”
“That’s what she said.”
We started with Dad’s office.
Empty filing cabinets.
Old invoices.
A rotary phone.
A calendar from 1995 still hanging on the wall.
Nothing.
Then the parts room.
Nothing.
The storage loft.
Nothing.
After ninety minutes, Marcus leaned against a workbench.
“Maybe ‘looking’ wasn’t literal.”
I stared at Bay Two.
The exact spot where Dad died.
I had not stepped across that threshold since the ambulance took him away.
Evelyn knew that.
She had been there.
She held my hand outside while the paramedics worked.
I walked toward the bay.
The concrete had cracked.
An old hydraulic lift remained bolted to the floor.
Against the back wall stood Dad’s red steel toolbox.
I froze.
“Abraham?”
I pointed.
“That.”
Marcus looked at it.
“You never removed it?”
“I couldn’t.”
We walked over.
The drawers were locked.
I still had the key.
Not on me.
At home, inside a cigar box with Dad’s watch.
Marcus started examining the hinges.
Agent Chen said, “We can get a warrant—”
I grabbed a pry bar.
Marcus smiled.
“Or that.”
The top drawer opened with a metallic scream.
Sockets.
Wrenches.
Electrical tape.
The second drawer contained old carburetor tools.
Third drawer—
Empty.
Except for a photograph.
I picked it up.
Evelyn.
She was thirty-one in the picture.
Standing beside our first Heartland truck.
Pregnant with Wyatt.
On the back, in her handwriting:
For the man who always fixes what everyone else gives up on.
My throat closed.
Marcus looked away respectfully.
I almost put the photograph in my pocket.
Then I noticed the cardboard backing was unusually thick.
I peeled it apart.
A tiny brass key fell into my palm.
Agent Chen leaned closer.
“That seems promising.”
The key fit nothing on the toolbox.
We searched nearby.
Then Marcus tapped the metal bottom of the lowest drawer.
“Hollow.”
He removed four bolts.
Underneath was a false panel.
Inside sat a weatherproof document pouch and one old black notebook.
I knew the notebook immediately.
Evelyn bought those exact notebooks by the dozen.
She used them for everything.
Grocery lists.
Charity planning.
Company questions.
Christmas gifts.
I opened it.
Page after page of handwritten entries.
Dates.
Vendor names.
Bank codes.
Amounts.
Thomas Bell’s initials appeared repeatedly.
So did Peter Nolan’s.
And another set.
I.C.
Irving Cole.
Eleven years earlier.
Long before Sabrina married Wyatt.
I looked at Marcus.
“They knew each other before our children did.”
Agent Chen photographed every page before anything moved.
Inside the waterproof pouch were copies of wire transfers.
One showed $175,000 from a Heartland vendor called Meridian Fleet Services to a consulting company owned by Thomas’s brother-in-law.
Another showed $90,000 paid to Nolan Medical Advisory LLC.
Another showed $60,000 to Irving Cole.
The dates went back thirteen years.
Evelyn had uncovered a kickback scheme.
A large one.
Maybe larger than we were seeing.
At the bottom of the pouch was a sealed envelope.
My name was written across the front.
ABE.
Nobody spoke.
My hands shook as I opened it.
Inside was a handwritten letter.
Abe,
If you are reading this because I finally worked up the courage to show you, then you are probably angry that I kept it from you.
If you are reading it because something happened to me, please do not let anger make you careless.
Thomas has been taking money from Heartland.
I believe Irving Cole is helping him move some of it through private investment companies.
There is also a doctor named Peter Nolan involved in ways I do not understand.
I have not told Wyatt. He is too young and trusts Thomas completely.
I spoke to Daniel because Thomas would notice if I hired an investigator through anyone connected to the company. Daniel knows people outside our circle and agreed to help.
I know you and your brother are difficult with each other. Please don’t waste time being angry at me for that.
There is something else.
I have been feeling sick after several meetings at St. Andrew’s.
Headaches. Racing heart. Nausea.
Dr. Nolan says it is stress.
I no longer trust Dr. Nolan.
I have arranged an independent appointment in Kansas City next Thursday.
If I’m wrong, I will laugh about this with you.
If I’m right, please protect Wyatt.
And Abe—
Do not protect Heartland more fiercely than you protect yourself.
A company can be rebuilt.
You cannot.
I love you.
Evelyn.
I read it twice.
Then a third time.
Next Thursday.
She died on Tuesday.
Two days before the appointment.
I could not breathe.
Marcus placed a hand on my shoulder.
“Abe.”
I folded the letter carefully.
Agent Chen’s face had changed.
“This is no longer just a fraud investigation.”
I looked at her.
“What can you do?”
“We need the medical history.”
“Records from eleven years ago?”
“If they still exist.”
“St. Andrew’s.”
“Yes.”
I remembered Wyatt’s terror.
Don’t take me there.
“They’ll destroy them.”
Agent Chen already had her phone out.
“Not if we get there first.”
Then Marcus’s phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed immediately.
“What?”
He turned toward me.
“It’s the hospital.”
My heart stopped.
“Wyatt?”
“He’s okay.”
I nearly collapsed from relief.
“What happened?”
Marcus listened.
Then his eyes hardened.
“A woman entered his room claiming to be a night nurse.”
My stomach dropped.
“She tried to inject something into his IV.”
Agent Chen was already moving.
“Did they catch her?”
Marcus listened.
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?”
“She ran.”
He looked at me.
“But security found something in the syringe she dropped.”
“What?”
He swallowed.
“A lethal dose of potassium chloride.”
The shop went silent.
They had failed to kill Wyatt in the basement.
May you like
Now someone had tried again.
And this time, they knew exactly where he was.
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