Part 6
By noon the rain had stopped, but Millbrook still looked drowned.
Clouds hung low over town like dirty wool.
Water pooled in the cracked edges of parking lots and along the curbs downtown where old brick storefronts reflected in broken little ripples.
I left Drew sleeping and drove straight to Coach Garza’s house.
If the school and Sheriff’s Department were already stripping his office, then whatever he knew was either dangerous or embarrassing enough to bury quickly.
Maybe both.
Garza lived on the west edge of town in a faded ranch house with a detached garage and a sagging basketball hoop over the driveway.
The yard needed mowing.
A wind chime knocked softly against the porch rail every few seconds.
When I knocked, no one answered.
I knocked again.
Still nothing.
Then I noticed the mailbox overflowing with newspapers and circulars damp from the rain.
Nobody had been home for at least two days.
I stepped off the porch slowly, scanning the property.
That old instinct again.
Look for what doesn’t fit.
The garage door was cracked open maybe six inches.
Not enough for a car.
Enough for carelessness.
Or interruption.
I crouched and lifted it slowly.
The smell hit first.
Oil.
Dust.
And copper.
Blood.
Coach Garza sat slumped against a workbench in the back corner.
For one split second my brain tried to reject what my eyes were seeing.
Then training took over.
I crossed the garage fast.
Garza’s face was swollen badly along one side.
Dried blood darkened his collar.
His left arm bent wrong halfway between elbow and wrist.
But he was breathing.
Barely.
His eyes opened halfway when I knelt beside him.
Confusion first.
Then recognition.
“Wade?” he rasped.
“I’m calling an ambulance.”
His hand shot out weakly and grabbed my sleeve.
“No cops.”
“You need a hospital.”
“No cops.”
The force behind it surprised me.
Even broken nearly in half, the man meant it.
I looked around quickly.
No signs of robbery.
Nothing overturned except a metal stool near the workbench.
This wasn’t random violence.
Somebody came here looking for something.
Or sending another message.
“Who did this?” I asked quietly.
Garza’s eyes moved toward the open garage door before returning to me.
Fear.
Real fear.
“They know,” he whispered.
“Know what?”
He swallowed painfully.
“The shipments.”
My pulse slowed instead of sped up.
Danger sharpens details.
“What shipments?”
Garza tried to sit up and failed.
I helped steady him carefully.
His breath shuddered once.
“Painkillers,” he said.
“Steroids.
Some fentanyl mixed in lately.”
Cold settled into my stomach.
High school kids dealing fentanyl.
That changes the stakes instantly.
Garza kept talking in broken little pieces.
“Started small two years ago.
Wrestlers first.
Football boys too.
Then pills started moving through parties.”
“Who’s supplying?”
He laughed weakly and instantly regretted it.
Pain twisted his face.
“You think teenagers build distribution networks?”
That answered enough by itself.
Adults.
Organized.
Protected.
I glanced toward the driveway.
Still empty.
Still quiet except for the wind chime.
“Who’s involved?”
Garza looked at me a long moment before speaking again.
“Deputy Harris.”
There it was.
Spoken out loud now.
Not suspicion anymore.
Fact.
“He uses confiscated evidence,” Garza whispered.
“Stuff disappears before processing.
Barrett’s dealerships move product between counties.
Kids distribute at school.”
Jesus Christ.
Millbrook wasn’t covering up a bullying problem.
It was covering a pipeline.
“What about Coach Steel?”
Garza shut his eyes briefly.
“He knows enough to stay useful.”
“And Drew?”
Garza’s face tightened.
“He asked too many questions.”
I sat back slowly on my heels.
Not because I was shocked.
Because the pieces finally locked together completely.
Drew hears wrestlers talking.
Garza starts investigating.
Someone suspects Drew may know more than he does.
Steel isolates him after practice.
Six boys pressure him in the parking lot while Harris supervises.
Not random.
Not emotional.
Containment.
Garza gripped my sleeve again.
“They came here last night,” he whispered.
“Harris and two others.
Wanted my records.”
“Did they get them?”
A tiny smile touched the corner of his swollen mouth.
“No.”
“Where are they?”
He looked toward an old green tackle box sitting beneath the workbench.
I opened it carefully.
Inside were folders.
Flash drives.
A spiral notebook.
And photographs.
Lots of photographs.
Teenage boys exchanging pills behind the gym.
License plates.
Cash handoffs.
One picture showed Deputy Harris standing beside Ricky Barrett’s truck at night near the county fairgrounds.
Another showed Coach Steel talking to two men outside Barrett Auto Group after midnight.
Timestamped.
Documented.
Garza hadn’t just suspected something.
He’d been building a case.
“You were going to expose them.”
Garza looked exhausted now.
“I tried taking it to Thornton first.”
That hit harder than expected.
“And?”
“She told Harris.”
Of course she did.
Every layer connected upward instead of downward.
Small town corruption rarely looks dramatic from the outside.
Mostly it looks like football sponsorships, campaign donations, and adults deciding certain boys deserve protection more than certain truths deserve daylight.
A siren sounded faintly somewhere far off.
Garza heard it too and panicked instantly.
“No police.”
“It’s not police,” I said automatically.
Then realized I didn’t know that for sure.
I grabbed the tackle box.
“Can you walk?”
“No.”
“Then you’re going to hate the next part.”
I got him upright with one arm around his back.
He cried out once through clenched teeth when his broken arm shifted.
We made it halfway to my truck before two county cruisers turned onto the road.
Too fast.
Too direct.
Not coincidence.
Someone had eyes on the house.
“Get down,” I snapped.
I shoved Garza behind the truck just as the cruisers swung into the driveway hard enough to spray gravel.
Deputy Harris stepped out first.
Rain-dark uniform.
Hand resting casually near his holster.
His eyes found me immediately.
No surprise there at all.
Only irritation.
“Well,” he said calmly.
“This is becoming a habit.”
I stayed between him and Garza.
“You beat a schoolteacher half to death.”
Harris shrugged once.
“Funny thing about accusations.
People usually need proof.”
I lifted the tackle box slightly.
For the first time, his expression changed.
Tiny.
But real.
“There it is,” I said quietly.
The second deputy moved subtly to the side.
Angle for a better line.
Not procedure.
Positioning.
Harris smiled then, slow and humorless.
“You military boys always think evidence matters more than timing.”
The world narrowed again.
Wind moving across wet grass.
Garza breathing ragged behind me.
Two deputies in a driveway.
One corrupt.
One maybe scared enough to follow orders anyway.
And a tackle box full of material powerful men would kill to recover.
Then Harris said something that made the entire situation change shape.
“You know your son wasn’t actually the target, right?”
I felt every nerve in my body sharpen at once.
Harris tilted his head slightly.
“We thought Garza gave the files to Drew.”
Behind me, Coach Garza whispered one broken word.
“No…”
But it was already too late.
Because the moment Harris said that sentence out loud, I realized something terrifying.
If they believed Drew had the evidence, then the beating in the parking lot wasn’t punishment.
It was interrogation……………………
