Chapter 3

Deke came back at 7:40 that night. Walter saw the headlights sweep the kitchen wall. Cassie was at the table with the laptop open, still trying to find the appeal. Walter went to the door.

Deke stood on the porch with his hands in his fleece pockets. No clipboard this time. No orange paper. Just a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.

“Evening, Mr. Prine.”

Walter waited.

“Look,” Deke said. “I know this seems like a lot. The county doesn’t want to be the bad guy. We’d rather settle.”

Walter said nothing.

Deke pulled an envelope from his jacket. “Private buyer. Cash offer. Forty thousand over what the county assessed. You sign tonight, drop the appeal, and the eighteen-thousand-dollar demolition bill disappears. You walk away clean. Cassie gets a fresh start.”

Walter looked at the envelope. “Who’s the buyer?”

“Private party.”

“Who?”

Deke’s smile thinned. “You don’t need a name. You need a pen.”

Walter looked past him, at the county truck idling at the curb. “You mentioned the Fosters.”

Deke’s face changed. “What about them?”

“They lived at 206,” Walter said. “They fought their order. They’re in a rental in Bucyrus now. Their dog died in the move.”

“That’s not on us.”

“Their house came down in eleven days,” Walter said. “Yours was the name on the order.”

Deke stepped closer. His voice dropped. “You should think about Cassie. She works at the co-op. Kubiak supplies their lumber. One phone call, and her hours dry up. You want that?”

Walter didn’t raise his voice. He never did. He just looked at Deke the way he looked at a signal that wasn’t working.

“I want the buyer’s name,” he said.

Deke’s flush climbed his neck. He shoved the envelope against Walter’s chest. “Sign it. Or don’t. But the board meets February sixth. You come in with no lawyer and no money, and they’ll laugh you out of the room.”

He turned and walked to the truck. The envelope fell to the porch boards.

Cassie opened the door behind Walter. She had her phone up, recording.

“You got that?” Walter asked.

“All of it,” she said. “Including the Fosters.”

Walter bent and picked up the envelope. He didn’t open it. He put it on the kitchen table, next to the green binder.

The next morning, a Kubiak truck was parked across from 214. A man in a Kubiak jacket sat behind the wheel, watching the house. When Cassie came out to leave for work, he lifted his phone and took a picture of her.

Walter watched from the window. He didn’t move until the truck pulled away.

Then he went to the kitchen table and opened the green binder to the tab marked 214.