Chapter 5 - Page Nineteen
Maya spread three public records across a folding table at the neighborhood legal clinic.
One was the city's final Riverside Towers fire report. Another was the contractor's maintenance summary. The last was a sprinkler-system invoice downloaded from an old municipal database. Naomi read the amounts twice.
"Two hundred and six thousand dollars for replacement pump assemblies," she said. "Three weeks before the fire."
"And the final report says the pumps failed because your mother blocked the access corridor," Maya replied.
"That corridor wasn't even near the pumps."
"That's what I thought, too."
Maya tapped a thin line of text. Paid in full. Verified on site. Daniel Sterling's signature appeared under the certification. But the invoice listed a pump model that the manufacturer had stopped producing six years before the supposed installation.
Naomi felt cold. "So they charged for equipment they couldn't have installed."
"Maybe. We need a real expert before we say that in court."
"Daniel told me to look here."
Maya's pen stopped. "Daniel Sterling spoke to you?"
"For ten seconds outside the station."
"That man is married to the person accusing you of assault. Next time, tell me before I have to hear it from the other side."
Naomi nodded. Maya wasn't scolding her. She was giving her something she hadn't had since the fire: a plan with steps she could actually take.
They visited retired fire inspector Ed Kessler at his garage in Berwyn. He kept two retired rescue dogs and boxes of records he'd been told not to save. He studied the invoice, frowned, and pulled a city map toward him.
"This model number belongs to a pressure regulator, not a fire pump," he said. "Somebody copied the wrong item from a catalog. Sloppy fraud."
"Can you prove the pumps weren't replaced?" Naomi asked.
"Not from this. But I can tell you the original inspection file had twenty-seven pages."
Maya checked the report in her folder. "This one has twenty-six."
Ed nodded. "Page nineteen was a photograph of the basement control panel. I wrote the caption myself."
"Where's the page?"
May you like
He stared past her into the yard. A gray sedan was parked across the street with its engine running.
"I don't know," Ed said quietly. "But somebody has been asking that same question for a long time."
