“Nobody posts.”
Brack sighed.
“I know.”
Jory arrived an hour later.
Calvin handed her the paper.
She read the article.
Folded it.
Put it on the desk.
“That all?”
“For now.”
“Good.”
“You okay?”
“No.”
Calvin appreciated the answer.
“But I’m working.”
She picked up her tools.
That became the rhythm of the winter.
Legal pressure outside.
Engines inside.
Jory discovered that mechanical work gave her somewhere to put fear.
When a lawyer sent a threatening letter, she rebuilt a carburetor.
When a newspaper implied her father’s property dispute was connected to biker intimidation, she adjusted valves.
When a stranger parked across from Baxter’s Garage for forty minutes, she wrote down the licence plate and replaced a wheel bearing.
Calvin never told her not to worry.
He hated useless advice.
Instead, Iron Pines gave her routine.
Coffee at seven.
Parts deliveries.
Jobs on lifts.
Tommy arguing about ignition systems.
Nate losing pencils.
Brack pretending not to care about anything while caring about almost everything.
It was not protection in the cinematic sense.
Nobody formed a wall around her house.
Nobody threatened Devo.
It was something more ordinary.
When Jory arrived, the door opened.
When she needed a lift, someone gave her one.
When the black truck appeared, someone recorded it.
When legal documents needed copying, Nate copied them.
When Gerald had an appointment that conflicted with an engine job, Tommy finished the teardown but left every diagnostic decision for Jory.
It was a place solid enough to stand.
That mattered.
The formal charges came on a Tuesday in late January.
Diane called Calvin at 8:20.
He listened.
Asked her to repeat two points.
Then hung up.
Jory was rebuilding a transmission from an early-1970s Shovelhead.
She sat on a low stool with parts arranged on clean towels.
Calvin walked over.
Crouched beside the bench.
“They filed.”
Her hands stopped.
“What?”
“Charges.”
She set down the component she was holding.
“What charges?”
Calvin told her.
Fraud related to the development application.
Obstruction related to conduct surrounding witnesses and property pressure.
And a serious bodily-harm charge connected to the circumstances that left Gerald hospitalized.
Jory stared at the transmission.
“So they believe Dad didn’t just collapse.”
“They believe there’s enough evidence to put the question before a court.”
She nodded.
That correction mattered.
Jory had spent months imagining certainty.
Real investigations did not give certainty early.
They gave thresholds.
Evidence.
Reasonable grounds.
Charges.
Then courts decided the rest.
“What about Vickers?”
“Co-accused on multiple counts.”
She sat still.
Calvin waited.
“He’s been properly awake about four months,” she said.
Calvin knew she meant Gerald.
“Speech is getting better.”
“That’s good.”
“He can get maybe thirty words clearly without tiring.”
She looked at her hands.
“Every week he asks about the garage.”
Calvin said nothing.
“That’s always his question.”