Chapter 7 - Dad’s Second PhoneThe envelope for Victor contained one sheet of paper and a photograph.
The photograph showed Mom standing beside Victor Hale years earlier.
They were younger.
Victor wore a work shirt bearing the logo of an electrical contracting company.
On the back Mom had written:
Victor fixed what Tom tried to hide.
The letter was stranger.
Victor,
If Tom ever asks you to change records, refuse him.
I know what happened at Brookhaven.
I kept the original reports.
You said you wanted to make things right. If you mean that, tell the truth before someone gets hurt.
—Margaret
Brookhaven.
The name meant nothing to me.
Sarah searched public records.
A building called Brookhaven Court had burned nine years earlier.
Cause: electrical malfunction.
Insurance payout: $3.8 million.
Renovation contractor:
A company partly owned by my father.
Electrical subcontractor:
Victor Hale.
My pulse quickened.
“Was Ryan involved?”
“He was twenty-seven,” Sarah said. “Maybe.”
The Brookhaven payout had been used to pay creditors and finance a new company.
That new company eventually became Harrison Development Group.
Ryan’s empire had been born from insurance money after a fire.
A fire involving Victor Hale.
Suddenly Mercer Lofts looked less like a desperate act and more like repetition.
That afternoon, Detective Mendes obtained access to Dad’s phone records.
She could not share everything.
But she told me enough.
Dad maintained a second cell phone.
Prepaid.
Unregistered under his name.
It had contacted Victor Hale seventeen times during the month before the fire.
It had contacted Ryan thirty-two times.
And at 1:54 a.m. the morning of the fire, nine minutes before 911 was called, it contacted a fourth number.
“Whose?” I asked.
“We’re tracing it.”
At 5:20 p.m., someone finally found Victor.
He walked into a police station three counties away.
Alive.
Terrified.
And asking for immunity.
I did not hear his interview.
But the following morning, Mendes called Sarah and me to the district attorney’s office.
The prosecutor, Elena Park, sat across from us.
“Mr. Hale has made allegations involving your father and brother.”
“What kind?”
Park spoke carefully.
“He claims the Mercer Lofts fire was intentional.”
Even prepared, the words felt heavy.
“Who started it?”
“He says he manipulated electrical equipment at Ryan’s direction.”
My mouth went dry.
“And Dad?”
“He claims your father knew.”
I closed my eyes.
Park continued.
“But there’s a complication.”
Of course there was.
“Victor says the original plan was not supposed to endanger residents.”
I stared at her.
“How exactly do you set an apartment building on fire without endangering residents?”
“He says the system was supposed to fail in a limited section after an evacuation event.”
“What evacuation event?”
“A gas leak.”
Sarah leaned forward.
“There was no gas leak.”
“Correct.”
According to Victor, someone was supposed to trigger an alarm shortly before the fire.
Residents would evacuate.
Then a controlled electrical fire would damage the basement systems and part of the building.
Enough for a major claim.
Not enough to destroy everything.
But the alarm never happened.
Victor claimed he panicked when he realized residents remained inside.
He attempted to disable the setup.
Something went wrong.
The fire began anyway.
“Why didn’t he call 911 immediately?” I asked.
“He says Ryan threatened him.”
“Do you believe him?”
Park didn’t answer directly.
“We verify evidence.”
My kind of person.
“Why did he disappear?”
“He says your father paid him to leave.”
My throat tightened.
“And the gas leak?”
Park slid a photograph toward me.
A portable gas detector.
“Found in Ryan’s vehicle.”
Then another.
Printed instructions for Mercer Lofts’ fire alarm control panel.
Then another.
A floor plan.
My apartment was circled.
Red ink.
“Why is my apartment marked?”
Park looked toward Mendes.
Mendes answered.
“We asked Victor.”
“And?”
“He claims the original insurance plan changed three days before the fire.”
“How?”
“Ryan said you had documents that could ruin him.”
I stopped breathing for a second.
“He wanted my apartment burned.”
“Victor says Ryan instructed him to ensure Unit 4B suffered maximum damage.”
Sarah’s hand tightened around her pen.
I asked the question quietly.
“Did Ryan know I had moved out?”
“No.”
The room became very still.
So the note—MOVE HER BEFORE THURSDAY—might not have been from Ryan.
Someone had wanted me out.
Someone had tried to protect me.
“Who wrote the note?”
“Victor says he didn’t know it existed.”
“Dad?”
“No answer yet.”
Then Park’s phone rang.
She listened.
Her expression sharpened.
After hanging up, she looked at me.
“The fourth number from your father’s second phone has been identified.”
“Who?”
“Your building manager.”
I blinked.
“Mr. Collins?”
“Yes.”
“He called 911.”
“That’s correct.”
My mind raced.
Dad called Collins at 1:54.
Nine minutes later, Collins called emergency services.
“What did Dad tell him?”
Mendes answered.
“That there was a gas smell and he needed to evacuate the building.”
I stared at her.
Dad had known.
And instead of stopping Ryan—
he had tried to empty the building without exposing why.
That did not make him innocent.
But it meant something inside him had broken from the plan.
Then Mendes added:
“Collins says your father told him one more thing.”
May you like
“What?”
“To get you out first.”
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