Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 64917 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 325(@200wpm)___ 260(@250wpm)___ 216(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64917 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 325(@200wpm)___ 260(@250wpm)___ 216(@300wpm)
I pushed through to the vault. The oak table scarred by a thousand knuckles, chairs labeled by patches and time, Pop’s gavel waiting at the head like a small hammer that had crushed big problems. His chair will always look too big. It didn’t matter that I filled it now; the wood still remembered him.
Brothers slid into seats. Shanks. Tower. Pull. Jester. Loco. Disciple. Peanut. One by one, they kept coming in. Clutch, followed by Dippy. Lead and Chains were the last in to seal the door behind them. Burn with a folder so thick it looked like it could stop a bullet was ready to share with the club.
I picked up the gavel and let it fall once. The room snapped tight. “Call to order.”
Burn didn’t wait for me to ask. He stood, the top page of his file clipped to a cardboard back, the rest bound in rubber bands. He looked like a man who’d dug up a body and was about to show it to us.
“Judge Walsh,” he said.
A growl rolled around the table, low and collective.
Burn flipped the top sheet. “We been saying for weeks he’s on the take. I can now tell you who’s holding the leash and why he wears the fucking collar to toe the line. Walsh has been having an affair—last two years—with a married woman from Ashe County. Husband’s a bank VP at Tri-State Southern. Woman’s name is Darlene Kemp. She runs business arrangements for the bank.”
Nails snorted. “Of course her name is Darlene.”
Burn didn’t smile. He laid photographs down in the center—blurry telephoto shots of Walsh and a woman with big hair and careful makeup going in and out of a chain hotel. Receipts followed—rooms at the Belvoir Inn off 18, six times, spaced out like they thought they were smart. Text prints came next: time-stamped messages from a burner number saved under some idiot pseudonym.
“How’s Hampton factor?” I asked, voice steady.
Burn tapped the corner of a receipt. “Hotel’s on a county vendor card. Not Walsh’s. Belongs to the Civic Renewal Office. Hampton’s office administers it. That card got swiped for two rooms, four nights, right before Walsh accepted a ‘temporary assignment’ to the district bench here.” Burn’s finger moved to another paper. “Private investigator on Hampton’s payroll from last fall—one Ted Malley—caught them together. Hampton confronted Walsh with photos, told him he’d back his appointment if Walsh played ball in this district. Ball equals bail denials, motion denials, jury instructions we all saw.”
“Jesus,” Loco muttered. “Who approved the card use?”
“County clerk’s office. We got a name: Sutter. Signed off with a forged ‘emergency lodging’ note under the flood relief line item.” Burn’s eyes went colder. “Which brings me to part two. Hampton’s been embezzling federal and state funds since the pandemic money started flowing. He set up three shell vendors—Stanley Aggregate & Paving LLC, Cape Yaw Consulting, and a nonprofit front called Douglas & Fine Arts Initiative. He shuffles grants through change orders, ‘emergency’ procurements, no-bid contracts, then launders through those three. Out the back end, money hits personal accounts, personal real estate, and debts owed by people he’s got under his thumb.”
Peanut whistled, the sound sharp. “You got numbers?”
Burn drew a folded paper ledger—handwritten, angry. “Preliminary. Tri-State Southern accounts ending 6832, 7741, 2209. Over three years: five-point-two million moved through. Of that, one-point-nine to Stanley Aggregate. We don’t see a single load of gravel delivered for half those invoices. Cape Yaw billed forty-eight grand for ‘consulting’ the same week it formed. Douglas & Fine Arts claimed they muraled four community centers—two of those buildings don’t exist.”
“Who’s on paper for those entities?” I asked.
Burn smiled, mean. “Not Hampton. He used proxies. Stanley Aggregate lists a cousin, Duke. Cape Yaw belongs to a blind trust created by a law firm called Wex & Elkin—they’re Walsh’s old golfing buddies. Douglas & Fine Arts’ incorporator is a church deacon who suddenly has a new truck and no explanation.”
Dippy leaned forward, tapping the photos. “And you’re sure Walsh knows Hampton’s hands are in the till?”
“Positive,” Burn said. “Walsh was at a fundraiser three months back. The bank VP husband to Darlene, Hampton, they were all in the same room. The VP’s loans keep the county flush when the embezzled money leaves holes. Everybody gets paid. Everybody keeps quiet. Hampton keeps the receipts and photos in a safe—two, actually. One at city hall in his office. One in his house under the stairs.”
Shanks’s fingers drummed the table. “Anyone we can flip?”
Burn nodded at a name on the ledger. “Sutter. County clerk. He’s been forging approval memos. He owes Hampton a favor from a DUI that disappeared. He’s sweating now because the feds started sniffing around misallocations in neighboring counties. He’ll crack if we squeeze him right.”
Jester’s eyes narrowed. “Not with fists,” he warned. “As much as I want to put them all in the ground. We need admissible, not a confession with a broken jaw, for GJ.”