Chapter 34 - Fire in the Records Room
The intruder never reached Eli.
He reached the records room instead.
By the time Sloan and Graham entered the hallway, smoke curled beneath the door.
“Fire!” Graham shouted.
The building erupted into motion.
Arthur pulled the alarm.
Mara evacuated students through the front entrance.
Daniel Mercer rushed from the automotive bay with two extinguishers.
Graham kicked open the records-room door.
Flames climbed one wall.
A masked figure scrambled through a side window.
Sloan ran outside after him.
Graham and Daniel attacked the fire.
Within six minutes, the flames were contained.
Within twelve, firefighters arrived.
Within thirty, Foundation House was surrounded by police vehicles again.
Arthur stared at the blackened wall.
“Second building somebody tried burning around me.”
“Your personality inspires strong reactions,” Graham said.
Arthur glanced at him.
“That supposed to be funny?”
“Marginally.”
Eli sat wrapped in a blanket outside.
Mara crouched beside him.
“You okay?”
He nodded.
But he wasn't.
She could tell.
“I brought this here.”
“No.”
“Rachel’s drive. They came because of me.”
“They came because they’re afraid of the truth.”
“That doesn't make the building less burned.”
Mara understood that kind of guilt.
She had watched Arthur carry it for decades.
“You know what Graham once told my dad?”
Eli shook his head.
“Two things can be true. Something bad can happen because you made a choice, and that still doesn't make the people hurting you innocent.”
Eli looked toward the smoke.
“What if somebody gets killed?”
Mara had no easy answer.
So she gave him the honest one.
“Then we protect each other smarter.”
Sloan returned twenty minutes later.
She had not caught the intruder.
But she found something.
A county-issued access card.
Melissa Crane’s department.
“That could have been stolen,” Sloan cautioned.
Graham examined it.
“Or provided.”
Police recovered security footage from a nearby traffic camera.
The masked suspect had arrived in a gray maintenance van.
The plate was visible for three frames.
Registered owner:
Harborstone Community Services.
By midnight, Sloan had enough for federal subpoenas.
But Melissa Crane had disappeared.
Her phone was off.
Her house was empty.
Her office computer had been wiped.
The next morning, local television stations arrived.
Not to cover the fire.
To accuse Foundation House.
Graham watched from the lobby television as a reporter stood outside county headquarters.
“Anonymous sources have alleged serious financial irregularities at Foundation House, the nonprofit operated by prominent engineer Graham Foster and his fiancée Mara Ellison.”
Mara stopped walking.
“What?”
The report continued.
“Documents obtained overnight appear to show charitable donations being diverted into private accounts linked to Foster & Associates.”
Graham’s phone began ringing.
Then Mara’s.
Then the Foundation House office line.
Arthur stared at the television.
“That's garbage.”
Graham’s chief financial officer called from Chicago.
“Graham, our bank froze the Foundation House operating account pending fraud review.”
“How much cash do we have?”
“Enough for payroll through Friday.”
Mara’s face drained.
“There are thirty-two teenagers receiving wages.”
“I know.”
The reporter continued.
“County sources also allege Foundation House interfered with lawful child placements and harbored a violent runaway.”
The television showed Eli’s school photograph.
His full name.
His age.
His history.
Eli walked into the lobby.
He saw himself on screen.
Everything inside him collapsed.
“They found me.”
Graham turned.
Eli backed toward the door.
“Eli—”
“You said nobody was putting me in a car.”
“Nobody is.”
“They don't need to.”
He looked at the television.
“They just put me everywhere.”
Then he ran.
Mara shouted after him.
May you like
Graham followed.
But by the time they reached the street, Eli Reed had disappeared.
