Chapter 6 - Smoke in the Basement
“I’m already coming.”
James swore once, quietly, on the other end of the phone.
“Grace.”
“Maya called me, not you.”
“That is not a reason to walk into a basement with Victor.”
“It is if she’s still down there.”
Chloe was asleep in the bedroom.
I hated the decision before I made it.
I called Patrice’s number, got voicemail, then called the one person I knew would answer at dawn on Christmas.
Mrs. Alvarez, our regular babysitter, picked up on the fourth ring.
“Grace?”
“I need a favor.”
Twenty minutes later, her nephew dropped her outside the Prince Street apartment in pajama pants and a red church coat.
She took one look at my face and did not ask for an explanation.
“Go,” she said. “I have her.”
My chest tightened.
“You just got back from Worcester.”
“And you look like you’re about to do something foolish. Go before I change my mind.”
I kissed Chloe’s forehead, left the emergency number beside the bed, and ran downstairs.
James’s SUV pulled up as I hit the sidewalk.
He got out himself.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“You have a sick child upstairs.”
“With someone I trust.”
“And you think I’m going to take you toward a man who may be destroying evidence?”
“I think you can either take me or watch me call a cab.”
His eyes closed briefly.
“Get in.”
The restaurant’s rear alley smelled like snow, garbage, and wood smoke.
That last smell made all of us move faster.
Elias unlocked the service entrance.
A thin gray haze hung near the basement stairs.
“Victor!” James shouted.
No answer.
We went down.
The basement was divided into storage cages, wine racks, a utility room, and a cramped office where old schedules and vendor invoices were kept.
A metal trash can sat in the center of the office.
Flames licked from the top.
Maya stood against the far wall with a fire extinguisher in both hands.
Victor was between her and the door.
His tie was gone. His shirt sleeves were rolled up. A line of sweat shone along his temple.
“Move,” James said.
Victor turned.
Since I had known him, I had never seen him look unprepared. Now he did.
Maya swung the extinguisher nozzle toward the trash can and squeezed.
White powder exploded through the room.
Victor lunged for the can.
Elias caught him by the arm.
“Don’t.”
Victor jerked away.
“I am cleaning out obsolete records.”
“At four-thirty on Christmas morning?” Maya coughed.
James stepped into the office.
“What did you burn?”
“Old schedules.”
“Why?”
“Because I was suspended after midnight by a man who suddenly decided every management decision I made for eleven years was criminal.”
James’s face did not change.
“I asked what you burned.”
Victor looked at the smoking can.
“Nothing you need.”
Maya laughed bitterly.
“He burned three shift books and the incident binder.”
Victor spun toward her.
“You broke into a closed restaurant.”
“I used the key you forgot I still had.”
His expression sharpened.
“You were terminated.”
“I was accused.”
“You had stolen property in your locker.”
“You put it there.”
The basement seemed to shrink around them.
Maya’s hair was damp from snow. She wore jeans, a puffer jacket, and work boots. I had forgotten how small she was.
She had always moved like someone taller.
“You want to tell him the rest?” Victor asked.
Maya’s mouth tightened.
“I took one bottle.”
I stared at her.
She looked at me.
“A customer gave it to me after his anniversary dinner. I knew I was supposed to clear gifts with management. I didn’t.”
Victor spread his hands.
“Thank you.”
“But you found out two weeks later,” she continued. “You told me you’d ignore it if I stopped asking about Devon.”
James looked at Victor.
Maya stepped closer.
“When I wouldn’t, you put a reserve bottle in my locker and claimed I had been stealing for months.”
Victor’s face hardened.
“You were drinking after shift.”
“So were half the bartenders.”
“You were insubordinate.”
“Because a seventeen-year-old cut his hand open on a machine you knew was unsafe.”
“Enough,” James said.
Everyone stopped.
He looked at the shelves.
“What’s left?”
Elias moved toward the lowest shelf, where several binders had been pulled down.
One lay half under a crate of cleaning supplies.
Its plastic cover had melted at one corner, but the pages inside were mostly intact.
Elias opened it.
“Incident log.”
Victor’s face changed.
Only slightly.
Enough.
James saw it.
Maya saw it.
I saw it.
Elias flipped through the pages.
“June. July. August.”
He stopped.
A page had been torn out.
“Devon?” I asked.
Maya shook her head.
“No. His was August twelfth.”
Elias turned two more pages.
There was Devon’s incident report.
The handwritten note at the bottom said: Guard damaged during improper employee use.
Maya leaned over it.
“That’s not the original.”
Victor laughed.
“You have photographic memory now?”
“I watched Devon sign the original. That sentence wasn’t there.”
James took the binder.
“Who wrote it?”
Victor folded his arms.
“I did. After maintenance confirmed the damage.”
Elias looked at the ink.
“Different pen.”
Victor’s patience broke.
“Oh, for God’s sake. Yes, I amended an incident report. That happens.”
Maya pointed toward a shelf.
“Then why did you burn the maintenance requests?”
Victor looked at her.
Maya’s eyes narrowed.
“You did, didn’t you?”
No one spoke.
The truth was not in the surviving papers.
It was in his face.
James put the binder down.
“Elias. Call the police.”
Victor stared at him.
“For burning my own paperwork?”
“For trespassing after your access was revoked, destroying business records, and cornering a former employee in a basement.”
Victor barked out a laugh.
“You are calling the police?”
The contempt in his voice was sharp enough to cut.
James went very still.
“That surprises you?”
“It would surprise your father.”
James’s mouth tightened.
Victor stepped closer.
“Do it. Invite them in. Invite every reporter in Boston too. Let them ask what kind of business you run. Let them ask why employees were afraid to complain. Let them ask why everybody in this city thinks your last name means consequences.”
James said nothing.
Victor smiled.
“You want clean hands? Open the door.”
Elias had his phone out.
But he was not dialing.
James noticed.
“So did I,” Elias said.
James turned to him.
Elias lowered the phone.
“I knew people were afraid of Victor.”
The smoke alarm began to shriek overhead.
May you like
Elias’s face was pale.
“I thought that was the point.”
