Twister turned from the bar.“Church.”
Chairs scraped.Boots hit the floor.Coffee mugs were abandoned.The whole room shifted in seconds from clubhouse chaos to business.We all gathered around the tables, and Twister took the head of the table.
Swift sat to his right.Hodge across from him.Magnum beside Hodge.Podge set his laptop in the middle.I sat next to Goldie, close enough that my knee brushed hers beneath the table.
She glanced at me, and I gave her a small nod.She looked nervous, but not scared.
There was a difference.
Twister tapped two fingers against the table.“Talk.”
Podge opened the laptop and turned it so we could see the screen.“Gene Kettler.Twenty-seven years old.Current address is on the east side, near Lake Monona.Small single-family house.Bought it thirteen years ago.No mortgage listed.”
Magnum leaned forward.“Paid cash?”
“Looks like it.”
Hodge grunted.“Of course he did.”
Podge clicked to another screen.“Employment history is where it gets strange.”
Goldie sat straighter.
Twister noticed.“What?”
She shook her head.“Let him finish.”
Podge nodded.“Gene Kettler currently works as a private compliance consultant.Before that, he spent one year as a procurement manager for a medical supply company.Before that, facilities coordinator at a private school.Before that, warehouse logistics.”
Swift frowned.“None of that sounds like city permitting.”
“It isn’t,” Goldie said quietly.
Everyone looked at her.She leaned closer to the laptop and scanned the screen.“If he signed off on permits, he should have worked for the city.Building department, planning, zoning, inspections, something.Even if he was only a temporary official, there should be a record.”
Podge clicked again.“There isn’t.”
Twister’s face hardened.“None?”
“No city employment record that I can find,” Podge said.“No pension record.No salary listing.No staff directory archive.Nothing.”
Hodge leaned back in his chair.“So how the hell did he sign city permits?”
Goldie rubbed her thumb over the edge of the table.“He shouldn’t have been able to.”
“But he did,” I said.
She nodded.“A lot.”
Podge pulled up another file.“More than a lot.I found his name on thirty-seven documents tied to the block.Some are permits.Some are inspection approvals.Some are easement adjustments.A few are old paper scans.”
“Can they be fake?”Magnum asked.
Goldie shook her head.“Maybe some, but not all.Not if they were accepted into the city system.”
Podge looked at her.“Exactly.The documents exist in archives.Some are scanned copies, but the record numbers are real.”
Twister was quiet for a second.“Meaning somebody inside the city made them real.”
