Higgins was placed on administrative leave while the sheriff's office and outside investigators reviewed the matter. He appeared briefly on a local news broadcast, insisting that the biker crowd had made the situation dangerous and that he had acted in good faith. Leo watched the clip once at the youth residence and turned off the television. The words were delivered so smoothly that he understood how the same man could keep a badge while children learned to fear him. Nora later told him that the recording from the gas station would be considered alongside Higgins's account, not replaced by it.
A separate review of Hank's records revealed discrepancies in invoices for work allegedly performed by the children. His rental properties showed repair bills for labor that no licensed contractor could confirm. There were bank withdrawals near dates when Hank had reported expenses related to the foster home, and there were forms listing services that other witnesses did not remember being provided. None of that alone established every allegation, but it widened the inquiry beyond Leo's injuries. It suggested that children had been useful to Hank as labor and as a source of payments he treated as his own.
Then a school counselor from Flagstaff came forward. Her name was Ellen Brooks, and she remembered Leo arriving one morning months earlier with difficulty carrying his backpack. She had asked whether he was hurt, but Leo had said he was sore from chores. Ellen had written a note and later spoken to Hank, accepting his explanation that Leo was careless and accident-prone. When investigators asked for her records, she provided them and admitted that she had not followed up as thoroughly as she should have.
Leo did not know what to feel about her statement. He remembered liking Ellen because she sometimes kept crackers in her desk and never complained when he took one after a hard morning. He also remembered wishing she would ask the question again after Hank left the school. She had not. The knowledge that she now regretted that failure did not change the morning when he had walked away believing the opportunity was gone.
"People are going to tell you they wish they'd done more," Talia said when he described his anger. "Some will mean it, and some may be more concerned about what their failure looks like now. You don't owe anybody an immediate apology for how you feel about that." Leo stared at the floor. "I don't know what I owe people anymore," he admitted. "Then maybe we start by separating what you choose to give from what somebody tells you you owe."
In the youth residence Leo began attending classes through a flexible education program. He was behind in two subjects, ahead in mathematics, and deeply impatient with worksheets that seemed written for children who had never seen a real problem solved. His teacher, Mr. Desmond, discovered that Leo could calculate gear ratios more quickly than he could write a standard paragraph about them. Rather than scolding him for the difference, the teacher asked Leo to explain a repair in clear prose so another student could understand it. Leo realized that technical knowledge was only useful when he could communicate it.