Four Thousand Pounds Against the Mahogany Garage Doors
CHAPTER 6: THE ICE ROAD AUCTION
The midnight wind screamed across the summit ridge of the Endless Mountains, blowing clouds of diamond-sharp ice dust through the glare of the Timberjack’s heavy halogen roof bars.
Silas Larkin sat in the enclosed, heated steel cab of the massive twenty-ton logging skidder, his hands steady on the hydraulic steering levers. Four massive steel-studded logging chains wrapped around five-foot-tall forestry tires bit deep into the glazed sheet ice, hauling the enormous green machine steadily up the treacherous twelve-percent mountain road. Behind the skidder, chained securely to its heavy steel recovery winch, was a four-wheel-drive state police tactical transport carrying Captain Hayes and four armed state troopers.
June sat beside her father in the skidder cab, monitoring the GPS topographic trail map on her tablet.
“Wexler’s private helicopter service canceled their flight from Philadelphia due to zero visibility,” June said, her voice clear above the roar of the massive diesel engine. “His private security vehicle is idling in his courtyard, but they can’t get down the ridge without sliding into the gorge.”
The skidder crested the final limestone bluff, bursting onto the frozen cobblestone courtyard of the Wexler estate.
The scene was bathed in the harsh white glow of portable quartz work lights.
Conrad Wexler stood in his courtyard, wearing a heavy arctic expedition parka, frantically trying to hook a heavy nylon tow strap from his luxury SUV to the bumper of his golf cart, which was still wedged beneath the massive four-thousand-pound pile of split oak firewood blocking his garage doors. Standing beside him were two private security guards armed with semi-automatic rifles, their breath steaming in the bitter mountain air.
Inside the garage, visible through the shattered glass upper panels of the mahogany doors, sat two vintage collector sports cars—a Ferrari 250 GT and an Aston Martin DB5—worth millions of dollars. But between the cars and the courtyard lay two tons of frozen, interlocking white oak logs, immovable as a granite fortress.
As the massive twenty-ton Timberjack skidder rumbled into the courtyard, its steel tire chains clattering violently against the cobblestones, Wexler dropped the tow strap and scrambled toward his SUV.
“Conrad Wexler!” Captain Hayes’s voice boomed through the tactical transport’s public address system. “State Police! Drop your weapons and step away from the vehicles!”
Wexler’s two private guards took one look at the massive logging skidder, the armed state troopers stepping down from the transport with rifles drawn, and immediately dropped their weapons onto the snow, raising their gloved hands above their heads.
Wexler, however, spun around and lunged for the open driver door of his SUV.
Silas didn’t hesitate. With one smooth, practiced movement of his right forearm, he dropped the skidder’s six-foot steel front dozer blade flat onto the cobblestones. The heavy diesel engine roared, and the skidder surged forward ten feet, planting its massive steel blade flush against the driver-side door of Wexler’s SUV, pinning the door shut with forty thousand pounds of immovable hydraulic pressure.
Wexler bounced off the steel blade, falling backward onto the frozen stones.
“You’re insane!” Wexler screamed, his face white with terror as he stared up at the massive steel machine towering over him. “I’ll have you executed! I’ll buy this entire mountain and burn it to the ground!”
Captain Hayes and two troopers stepped forward, pinned Wexler face-down into the snow, and clicked heavy steel handcuffs around his wrists.
Ranger Naomi Price walked up to the garage doors. With a pry bar, she popped open the glove box of Wexler’s crushed golf cart. Inside lay a leather briefcase containing twenty-four forged maritime bills of lading, a satellite phone, and an encrypted hard drive labeled Rotterdam Timber Consignment—Final Accounting.
Price looked over at Silas, who climbed down from the skidder cab into the freezing wind.
“We have the complete export ledger, Silas,” Price said, holding the drive up to the lights. “Every transaction, every bank wire, and the recorded telephone order Wexler gave to his security team the night Caleb was killed.”
Silas stood on the cobblestones, looking at the arrogant man lying handcuffed in the snow, and then up at the four-thousand-pound wall of oak logs still wedged firmly against the mahogany garage doors.
Wexler looked up through the snow, shivering violently, his voice cracking into a pathetic, broken sob. “Please… Larkin… get this wood off my doors… my collector cars are going to freeze…”
Silas looked down at him with quiet, unshakeable dignity.
“The wood stays right where you ordered it, Wexler,” Silas said softly. “Gravity delivered it, and justice will keep it there.”
