Chapter 13
The Moretti intake log listed sixty-three contacts after the bridge collapse.
Reporters.
Psychics.
Reward seekers.
People claiming rival families had arranged the collapse.
My first call appeared on January nineteenth.
Female caller. Claims direct rescue. No corroboration. Referred to G.C.
The next line had been removed.
Not blacked out.
Cut from the photocopy so cleanly the page numbering shifted.
Amina held it toward the light.
“This came from a digital export.”
“How do you know?”
“Consistent typeface and no staple distortion. Someone generated it after deleting a line.”
The certified-mail record appeared in the second box.
My envelope had arrived.
The attached message summary contained one sentence I remembered dictating:
Bridge made prolonged metal groan; no explosion heard before failure. City maintenance truck observed leaving north access moments before collapse.
A handwritten instruction crossed the bottom.
Do not circulate. Close claimant. G.C.
Amina stared at the initials.
“Gabriel Costa.”
“Yes.”
“Did you see a maintenance truck?”
“I saw amber lights through the rain. It could have been a city vehicle or contractor.”
“Why didn’t you tell Luca at the gala?”
“Because his daughter had just walked across a ballroom. I was not going to accuse his security chief based on lights I saw through a storm.”
“Reasonable.”
She photographed the page.
“Annoyingly reasonable.”
Vincent arranged an independent review led by retired detective Daniel Hayes.
Hayes met us in a conference room above a coffee shop. He was sixty, broad through the middle, with a mustache that made every sentence sound more skeptical than it was.
He read my voicemail transcript.
Then the intake records.
Then my certified-mail receipts.
“You keep everything.”
“I keep what people may later deny.”
“Good habit. Terrible for holidays.”
He opened a city map.
“Ashwood Bridge underwent inspection six months before collapse. The municipal file says no urgent defects.”
May you like
“Was there a full report?” I asked.
“No.”
