Chapter 6 - Smoke in the Dark
“Back away.”
Nico grabbed the bottom of the shutter and pulled.
It didn’t move.
A flame appeared in the thin gap beneath it.
For a second it looked small enough to stamp out.
Then it ran across the gasoline.
Heat pushed into the room.
Luca turned his chair sharply.
“Rear wall. There should be a service panel.”
I swept my phone light across the shelves.
“There.”
A square vent sat behind the stacked tires.
Too small for a person.
Beside it was a red-painted steel door half-hidden by plywood.
Nico kicked the plywood away.
The door had been bolted from our side.
He pulled the bolt.
It stuck.
Smoke curled along the ceiling.
I tucked the hard drive and repair order into my apron pocket.
“Toolbox,” Luca said.
I handed Nico a hammer.
He struck the bolt once.
Twice.
The fire reached a cardboard box beside the shutter.
Nico hit it again.
The door opened onto a narrow maintenance alley.
A concrete step dropped eight inches to the ground.
Nico looked at Luca’s chair.
“I’ll lift the front.”
“Tip me back first,” Luca said. “Don’t grab the footplate.”
Even with smoke pouring around him, he knew exactly how to tell us what he needed.
I held the door.
Nico eased the rear wheels over the step and lowered him carefully.
Then he pulled me through.
My back struck the frame.
Pain flashed white.
I stumbled into the alley and vomited beside a trash bin.
Nico called emergency services.
Luca rolled beside me.
“Hannah.”
“I got it.”
I pulled the hard drive from my pocket.
He looked at it.
Then at the blood on my sleeve where I had reached behind me.
“You could have left it.”
“No.”
Fire engines turned into the lot.
A gray SUV accelerated out of the far exit.
Nico caught part of the plate on his phone.
At the hospital, Dr. Shaw found us again and looked ready to strangle all three of us.
“You tore two stitches.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Be sorry while holding still.”
A detective arrived before dawn.
Elena Ruiz. Dark hair tied back. No patience for evasive answers.
She took the hard drive in an evidence bag.
Then I showed her the repair order.
Her eyes stopped on my father’s name.
“Daniel Miller?”
“Yes.”
May you like
She looked toward the closed treatment-room door.
“I need you to tell me exactly how your father died.”
