Carl snorted. “Figures.”
My phone buzzed on the desk.Dunn:Hayes confirms two sightings, both a dark pickup withacracked right taillight. One had a removable white square on the tailgate—logo unknown. No full plates yet. Watch your corners.
Another buzz.Jake Rainer:Pulled a list of new contractor permits in a 30-mile radius. Three companies spun up in the last 6 months. One’s “North Fork Aggregate.” Paper trail smells like a shell. Mailing address forwards through a UPS box in Cedar Bend. Want the packet?
I texted back:Send summaries now; I’ll grab the full packet later.
Jake replied with bullet points like he’s still on active duty:
•North Fork Aggregate, LLC– registered 4 months ago. UPS box. Bank in Red Hollow.
•Pioneer Facilities Group– registered 6 months ago. Shares a phone exchange with Peterson Properties’ legal firm.
•RidgeLine Logistics– 5 months. Lists three pickups on insurance; one is a ¾-ton diesel, color “black/charcoal,” no listed decals.
My stomach did a slow, unpleasant turn. I showed the screen to Mason and Levi. Their faces settled into the same hard calculation mine was wearing.
“Peterson?” Mason asked.
“Could be a coincidence,” I said.
“We don’t get many of those,” Levi muttered. “Pioneer sharing a phone exchange with the mayor’s legal folks is the kind of coincidence that gets people elected and unelected.”
I scrubbed through the footage again. The white square caught the light just enough for a hint of an angle inside it—two lines, not letters, more like a geometric logo. Could be a quarry mark. Could be a stylized “PF” if you squint.
“Carl,” I called. “You gotten any new vendors making deliveries for the mayor’s projects? Gravel, culverts, anything?”
Carl leaned on the doorframe, thinking. “New outfit called North Fork brought aggregate to the south pad two weeks back. Big ol’ black truck leading the convoy, loud enough to scare the pigeons dead.”
Levi whistled low. “And the plot thickens.”
“Who signed the delivery?” I asked.
“Site foreman from Peterson’s crew. Tall fella, buzz cut, called himself Trent. Didn’t look like a Trent. More like a man who misspells his own name on purpose.”
Mason grinned despite himself. “That’s a type.”
“Arnie been around?” I asked.
“Seen him jawin’ with folks at the diner,” Carl said. “Looked beat-up. Not in the fight way—in the ‘too many bad ideas’ way.”
Levi scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “We still holding the line that Arnie’s a pawn, not a king?”
“Until he proves otherwise,” I said. “Either way, he’s a handle we can pull.”
The back door banged; Justin Keller stepped in, smelling like leather and coffee. “You clowns playing detective without me?”
