Chapter 12 Not an Accident
Sabotage
Deck had spent most of his life trusting his instincts.
They'd kept him alive in places where hesitation got people killed.
They'd protected him through bad decisions, worse situations, and more mistakes than he cared to remember.
Right now, every instinct he possessed screamed the same thing.
The explosion hadn't been an accident.
The realization had been growing quietly for weeks.
Small inconsistencies.
Tiny details.
Things that didn't quite fit.
At first, he'd ignored them.
Because explosions happened.
Mechanical failures happened.
Fuel systems failed.
Old garages burned.
The explanation made sense.
It should have been enough.
Unfortunately, experience had taught him something important.
When enough little things stopped making sense, there was usually a reason.
And lately, too many things felt wrong.
The problem was Finn.
More specifically, protecting Finn.
The doctor already knew about the military service.
Knew about the trauma.
The secrets hidden inside the farmhouse office.
That conversation had been difficult enough.
Deck still remembered the look on Finn's face when the truth finally came out.
Not fear.
Not judgment.
Concern.
The reaction had somehow made everything worse.
Because concern made people stay.
Concern made people care.
Concern made them vulnerable.
The mechanic couldn't allow that.
Not if his instincts were right.
Not if someone had actually tried to kill him.
The thought lingered as he sat inside the garage office early Monday morning.
The building remained quiet.
Most employees hadn't arrived yet.
Sunlight filtered through dusty windows.
Coffee cooled beside him.
A stack of documents occupied the desk.
Insurance reports.
Fire investigation findings.
Repair estimates.
Months earlier, he'd skimmed through everything.
Now he was reading carefully.
Line by line.
Word by word.
Looking for something he'd missed.
The official investigation called the explosion accidental.
Fuel line failure.
Ignition source.
Catastrophic chain reaction.
Simple.
Clean.
Convenient.
Deck hated convenient explanations.
They usually hid inconvenient truths.
His phone buzzed.
A message from Finn.
Lunch today?
The sight immediately softened something inside his chest.
A dangerous habit.
The mechanic stared at the screen for a moment.
Then smiled despite himself.
Yeah.
The response arrived seconds later.
Good. Don't skip breakfast.
Deck rolled his eyes.
The doctor worried entirely too much.
The realization felt strangely comforting.
For several moments, he simply looked at the message.
Then forced himself back toward work.
Back toward questions.
Back toward problems.
The investigation file remained open.
The mechanic studied photographs from the explosion scene.
Twisted metal.
Burn damage.
Destroyed equipment.
The images still felt surreal.
That building had been his life.
The explosion had nearly ended it.
The thought settled heavily inside his chest.
A knock interrupted his concentration.
Kane stepped into the office carrying a coffee mug.
The older mechanic immediately noticed the paperwork.
Then frowned.
"You're doing it again."
Deck looked up.
"What?"
Riot pointed toward the photographs.
"The obsession thing."
The mechanic ignored him.
A strategy that rarely worked.
Kane sat down anyway.
Uninvited.
As usual.
The older man glanced at the documents.
His expression darkened slightly.
"You still think something's off."
The statement wasn't a question.
Deck remained silent.
The silence answered everything.
Riot sighed.
Long.
Tired.
Because he'd already heard this argument.
Several times.
"Insurance investigators cleared it."
The mechanic leaned back in his chair.
Thinking.
Analyzing.
Trusting instinct.
"Maybe."
Kane narrowed his eyes.
The older mechanic understood that tone.
Understood what it meant.
Years of friendship made certain things obvious.
"What did you find?"
Deck hesitated.
Not because he didn't trust Riot.
Because saying it aloud made it real.
The possibility stopped being paranoia.
Started becoming fact.
Finally, he slid a photograph across the desk.
The older mechanic studied it.
Frowned.
Looked again.
"What am I looking at?"
The mechanic pointed.
Near the damaged fuel system.
Almost hidden beneath soot and destruction.
A cut.
Small.
Precise.
Unnatural.
Not wear and tear.
Not failure.
Damage.
Intentional damage.
Riot's expression changed immediately.
The amusement disappeared.
Concern replaced it.
The older mechanic looked up slowly.
"You sure?"
Deck nodded.
The certainty felt cold.
Heavy.
"I rebuilt that line six months before the explosion."
The memory remained clear.
Very clear.
He remembered every inch of that car.
Every repair.
Every modification.
The line hadn't failed naturally.
Someone had made sure it failed.
The realization settled between them.
Dark.
Unwelcome.
Neither man spoke for several moments.
Finally Kane swore.
Quietly.
The mechanic understood why.
Because if the fuel line had been damaged deliberately, the implications became obvious.
The explosion wasn't random.
Someone caused it.
Someone planned it.
The question was why.
The answer arrived several hours later.
And it terrified him.
The breakthrough happened accidentally.
Like most important discoveries.
Deck spent the afternoon reviewing security records.
The garage cameras hadn't survived the explosion.
Most footage had been lost.
Destroyed.
Gone forever.
Except for one backup system.
A forgotten external drive.
The data remained incomplete.
Corrupted.
Difficult to recover.
Yet enough survived.
Enough to matter.
The mechanic sat alone inside the office as evening approached.
Computer screens illuminated the room.
Hours passed.
The footage flickered repeatedly.
Broken images.
Missing sections.
Fragments.
Then suddenly something appeared.
A figure.
Barely visible.
Moving through the garage late at night.
Several hours before the explosion.
Deck leaned forward.
His pulse quickened.
The image remained grainy.
Unclear.
Yet the timing mattered.
A lot.
Nobody should have been there.
Nobody.
The footage continued.
The figure disappeared near the section containing the classic muscle car.
The same vehicle involved in the explosion.
The same vehicle Deck had been restoring personally.
The realization hit hard.
Very hard.
The mechanic replayed the footage.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Searching for details.
Searching for identity.
The image remained frustratingly vague.
Yet one thing became obvious.
The person wasn't stealing anything.
Wasn't vandalizing anything.
They went directly toward the vehicle.
Then left.
Purposeful.
Intentional.
Focused.
The pattern made his blood run cold.
Because suddenly everything aligned.
The fuel line.
The timing.
The visitor from his military past.
The growing feeling that someone had been watching him.
The pieces finally connected.
The explosion wasn't the target.
He was.
The realization settled heavily across his shoulders.
Like weight.
Like responsibility.
Like danger.
The mechanic sat motionless.
Staring at the screen.
Thinking.
Calculating.
Because if someone sabotaged the vehicle intentionally, they knew exactly who worked on it.
Exactly who would be near it.
Exactly who would be hurt.
The conclusion felt unavoidable.
Brutal.
Terrifying.
The explosion hadn't been designed to destroy a garage.
It had been designed to kill Declan Harlan.
A cold knot formed inside his stomach.
Because suddenly the visitor's arrival made sense.
The military records.
The old secrets.
The ghosts returning.
None of it was coincidence.
Someone had reached into the past.
And now that past had followed him all the way to Willow Ridge.
The office felt strangely quiet.
The evening sunlight had disappeared completely.
Darkness gathered beyond the windows.
Deck stared at the damaged footage one final time.
The grainy figure remained frozen on the screen.
Unknown.
Unidentified.
Dangerous.
For the first time since the explosion, certainty replaced suspicion.
The attack had been deliberate.
He had been the target.
And whoever failed to kill him once might very well try again.
The Truth
Finn had reached his limit.
Not with Deck.
Never with Deck.
With the secrets.
With the distance.
With watching someone he loved carry the weight of the world while pretending everything was fine.
The realization followed him through an entire week.
A frustrating, exhausting week filled with half-truths and avoidance.
Ever since the visitor arrived at the garage, something had changed.
The progress they'd made over months seemed to be unraveling.
Not completely.
Just enough to hurt.
Deck still smiled at him.
Still kissed him.
Still sat beside him on the porch at night.
Yet part of him had disappeared behind old walls.
The doctor noticed it every day.
The distracted silences.
The tension.
The way his gaze constantly drifted toward doors and windows.
The way he checked locks twice before bed.
The way he seemed to listen for things nobody else could hear.
The behavior worried him.
Because it wasn't normal caution.
It was fear.
Real fear.
And Finn was tired of pretending not to see it.
The confrontation happened on a Thursday evening.
Rain tapped softly against the farmhouse windows.
Dinner sat untouched between them.
The mechanic looked exhausted.
Dark circles lingered beneath his eyes.
His jaw remained tight.
Everything about him seemed stretched too thin.
The sight made Finn's chest ache.
Because he knew what came next.
The truth.
Or the end of whatever this was becoming.
The doctor set down his fork.
The movement immediately drew Deck's attention.
Gray eyes lifted.
Tired.
Guarded.
"What?"
Finn folded his arms.
No more avoiding it.
No more waiting.
"We need to talk."
The mechanic's expression hardened instantly.
A reflex.