Chapter 29 - rising embers
By five o'clock in the morning, the rain had stopped, leaving the grounds of the estate shrouded in a thick, ghostly fog that rolled off the river. Four fire engines and six state police cruisers sat parked along the gravel driveway, their red and blue lights flashing rhythmically against the wet stone walls of the mansion.
The carriage house was nothing more than a smoking, black skeleton of charred timbers and twisted iron. Firefighters were still directing thin streams of water onto the smoldering foundation, white steam rising high into the grey morning air.
I sat on the rear bumper of an ambulance, wrapped in a heavy navy wool blanket, holding a warm paper cup of black coffee. Beside me sat Nora, holding sleeping Chloe wrapped in two fleece blankets against her chest.
A state investigator walked over to us, flipping open his notebook. "We found two bodies inside the stable ruins, Mr. Moretti. Both heavily burned near the rear office desk. We recovered two handguns and the remains of a steel safe."
"Did you find anything else?" I asked, my voice dry and scratchy from smoke inhalation.
The investigator hesitated, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small plastic evidence bag. Inside sat a scorched piece of steel—the outer casing of a silver Zippo lighter, its bottom half melted and blackened by extreme heat.
"Just this," the investigator said, handing the plastic bag to me. "It was sitting on the concrete floor near the rear exit ladder. Looks like it took the brunt of the blast."
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I took the bag into my hands, staring at the charred steel. The engraved birthdate on the bottom was completely melted away, leaving only a smooth, grey smudge where my brother's name had been.
Two hours later, senior partner Vance was arrested at his pent-house apartment in downtown Chicago, charged with corporate arson, tax fraud, and conspiracy to commit murder, based on the microfilm files that had been automatically transmitted to the Federal Prosecutor's office from my home computer during the fire.
