Save Me

Chapter Fifty-six

Rose hit the gas, with Warren in the passenger seat. He’d changed into slacks and a fresh polo shirt, which he’d had with him for night school, and he’d shaved in the school’s men’s room. She could see, in the light, that he was older than she’d thought, maybe thirty-five. Or maybe it was the grim set to his jaw, as if he were gearing up for the task ahead. They were in rush-hour traffic on the bucolic back roads out of Reesburgh, heading to Campanile’s headquarters, near West Chester.

“Okay, so what’s the plan?” Warren asked, looking over.

“Let’s review, okay?” Rose wasn’t sure what to do next. “We can’t know where we’re going if we don’t know where we’ve been.”

“That’s deep.”

“You’re telling me. I just learned it.” Rose smiled. “Now, Kurt thought that polyurethane left in the teachers’ lounge contributed to the explosion, but he was killed before I could ask him how. So far I’ve heard a few different reasons for the explosion, like faulty wiring, a gas leak, and a punch list not done. What have you heard?”

“The same thing, except for the punch list. Punch lists never get done, and nothing explodes.”

“So what caused the explosion?”

Warren shrugged. “The fire marshals’ report won’t come out for weeks, and that’s what the lawsuits will be about, and all that.”

“So let’s try to figure it out, ourselves. You’re an expert, and I’m a… mom.”

Warren smiled crookedly. “You’re kinda nutty, lady.”

Rose smiled back. She slowed, passing an Amish man driving a buggy, his head tilted down and only his beard visible under the brim of his straw hat. “We have an advantage. They think it’s accidental, and we don’t.”

“Okay.”

“So how exactly do you make an explosion with gas, loose wires, and cans of polyurethane?”

Warren looked over. “Where did you say the poly was?”

“The polyurethane? In the teachers’ lounge.” Rose thought back to her conversation with Kristen. “Somebody shellacked the cabinets on Thursday, the day before the explosion, and left it there. That seems odd to me.”

“Why?”

“Shellacking cabinets is the kind of thing they do before you move in, that’s what we did at my new house, and it was already done in the lounge, I saw a photo. Why do the cabinets need a second coat, all of a sudden? It was a month after school opened.”

Warren nodded slowly. “The teachers eat in there?”

“Some, yes.”

Warren wrinkled his nose. “That would stink.”

“It did, and that’s what I thought.” Rose thought again of Kristen. They whizzed by horse pastures with run-in sheds, and hand-painted signs advertising Halloween hay rides and corn mazes. “The lounge reeked of it, and there were WET PAINT signs everywhere.”

“That’s interesting.”

“Why?”

“The poly would have hidden any gas smell.”

Rose looked over, her ears pricking up. “So if a bad guy knew he was going to make a gas leak, he might shellac some cabinets to mask the odor.”

“Right.”

“How do you make a gas leak? Is that hard?”

“No, easy. The gas leaked in the wall between the kitchen and the lounge, and there was a big three-quarter-inch pipe there. I know, I cleaned up the debris. If somebody got into the building on Thursday or Thursday night, they could give the gas valve in the wall a quarter turn.”

“Wouldn’t that show, a hole in the wall?” Rose asked, as the country scenery gave way to a concrete ramp, heading to Route 202, going north.

“Not if it was behind a cabinet or an appliance. Gas would leak out, but nobody would smell it because of the poly, and they’d also get desensitized to it.”

Rose remembered Kurt telling her the same thing, about being desensitized. “So let’s say the bad guy shellacked the cabinets to hide the gas smell. How does the wall explode?”

“He needs a spark to make an explosion.” Warren frowned, in thought.

“Wouldn’t the loose wiring provide a spark?”

“It could, but not for sure.” Warren shook his head. “It’s not necessarily a live spark.”

“So what causes a live spark in a wall?”

“The spark didn’t have to be in the wall. The poly was in the teachers’ lounge, so the spark could have been in the teachers’ lounge. An appliance could do it, or the oven.”

Rose thought a minute. The Kristenburgers. “How about a microwave?”

“Yes. They could have rigged the micro to spark.”

“How?”

Warren looked over. “Ever put tinfoil in a microwave? You get live sparks, blue flashes, the whole nine.”

“No, tinfoil wouldn’t have worked. The teacher would have seen it.”

“Not if it was hidden inside the micro, like in the plastic part on top.” Warren’s brown eyes came to life. “Here we go, I got it. On Thursday, you shellac the cabinets and leave the poly out. It stinks. Then on Thursday night, when nobody’s around, you hide tinfoil in the microwave, turn a valve in the gas pipe, and loosen the wiring in the wall. An electrician could do all those things in fifteen minutes.”

“Okay.”

“Then, you leave the caps on the poly open a little, so the fumes leak into the micro. Nobody can tell because it stinks anyway, and you put up the signs.”

Rose was confused. “But how do fumes leak into a microwave?”

“They drift in.”

“I thought microwaves were closed, sealed.”

“No, they’re not. A spark in the micro, with poly fumes inside, would cause an explosion, and if the gas had been leaking in the wall, from a big, three-quarter-inch pipe, it would go boom!” Warren made an explosion with his thick fingers.

“What’s the loose wiring have to do with it? Isn’t that overkill?” Rose thought a minute, answering her own question. “Wait, maybe not.”

“Why not?”

“Because that would show up later, when the fire marshals come in. In other words, if you want to make it look like an accident, you need an innocent cause, like faulty wiring.” Rose felt astounded. It all made sense. “Like you said, a wire could spark, but you’re not sure enough. So it’s an explanation, but not a reliable-enough cause.”

“True.” Warren nodded, shifting forward. “An electrician could do all of this, easy. If he worked the job, he could have a key. Or somebody else would, like one of the higher-ups. Hell, Campanile is the GC, and they hire the guy who installs the damn locks.”

“Right.” Rose hadn’t thought of that. “So we need to know the electrical sub and the electrical crew that Campanile used on the job, and we take it from there.”

“How are you gonna get that?”

“I’m not, you are.”

“Me?” Warren looked at her like she was nuts. “How?”

“You’re a carpenter, right?”

“All my life. My dad was one.”

“Okay, so let’s say you could be looking for a job, at Campanile.” Rose accelerated. She booked it because it was already 4:15 and they had to get to Campanile before closing time. “You go in, apply for a job, and get the info in an informal way. In conversation.”

“How?”

“You can do it.” Rose looked over. “You look the part because you are the part, and you’re not from here, so you can ask a lot of questions without seeming suspicious. Where are you from, with your accent?”

“Arlington, Texas.”

“Can you ham it up a little?”

“Sure thang, ma’am,” Warren answered, slyly. “What’re my lines?”

“Say you’re from Texas and you think big. You need a new job and you want to start at the top, with the best. You heard Campanile was the best, stuff like that.”

“Kiss some ass.”

Rose nodded. “Say you need a new job, you want to move up. You want to work for Campanile and become-what’s it called, what you would be?”

“I’d love to be project manager.”

“Great. Does Campanile have project managers?”

“Sure. But I bet they promote from within.”

“Well, let them say that. Tell them you’re new to the area, so you don’t know any of the subcontractors, but you can work with anybody.”

“Should I mention Reesburgh?”

“No, I’d leave that out. I don’t want them connecting you with the fire at all.”

“But I have to get them to talk about subs on the Reesburgh job.”

“You can’t go about it directly.” Rose glanced over as the car whizzed along. “Wait. Listen. Subcontractors are important, right?”

“Sure.” Warren cocked his head, listening. “The finished job is only as good as the subs.”

“Exactly. Say that, and say you’re good at managing subs and getting them to do their best work. Tell some dumb story of a sub you managed in Texas.”

“I didn’t.”

“Make it up.” Rose didn’t know if this plan broke her lie diet, but she wasn’t the one lying. “Drop the names of some subs in Arlington, ask if they work with good subs, then bring the conversation around to electrical subs, then maybe you can get a name of an electrician or two on the job. How many could there have been? Not that many. Think you can do it?”

“Yes.” Warren straightened up.

“They’re big, so they might have a human resources person. If they don’t know who the subs are, you might have to get through that interview to somebody who does, like somebody not in administration.”

“I thought of that already. I’ll say I want to talk to somebody who’s been in the field. I’ll say I flew up here and don’t want to leave until I see somebody tonight.”

“Okay, good.” Rose felt a wave of worry for him. “If you can’t get them to say it, then just leave. Don’t do anything to arouse their suspicion. If they came after Kurt, they could come after you.”

“Let ’em try.” Warren lifted an eyebrow. “I’m from Texas.”