Page 105 of Not Quite Dead Yet

‘Invoice fraud?’ Jet said in a small voice. ‘Has Luke been committing invoice fraud? Pocketing the difference?’

‘This is the only example I found, but I can keep looking.’ Billy sniffed, shuffling his papers. ‘But I think you’ll want to see this first. You know Henry Lim was acting strange, told us he didn’t ever work for the company when you know he did?’

‘Yeah,’ Jet said, turning to the screen, ‘about that –’

‘– Well, I found a folder that had a lot of paperwork for the project on North Street.’

Jet turned back. ‘You did?’

‘Haven’t been through it all yet, but look.’

He handed her a sheet of paper. Jet laid it on the desk, picked up her flashlight.

‘It’s a delivery notice, from a scaffolding rental company, to North Street. Look who signed it off, who accepted the delivery.’

Jet could read this one, big looping writing in the box that said,Sign here.

‘Henry Lim,’ she said, reading out his signature. ‘I knew it. And he was on the North Street project too. When was this from?’

Billy prodded his finger against the top of the page. ‘Third of March, this year,’ he said.

But Henry hadn’t been on the March payroll. What the fuck was going on here?

‘March,’ Jet said. ‘That must have been right before his accide …’ she trailed off, abandoning the word, her mind busy with other words,what ifs andmaybes.

‘Jet –’

‘– Shh, thinking.’

She looked back at the screen, the pieces slotting into place, not a puzzle but a house, four walls but no roof, and somehow there was space for it inside her busted-open head.

‘Oh my god, Luke,’ she whispered.

‘What?’ Billy dropped to his knees again, eye to eye.

‘It’s not just invoice fraud,’ Jet said, voice coming back to her, bringing her heart up to her throat with it. ‘It’s tax fraud too. Luke is the one who does the payroll, the taxes. There are employees and contractors who are missing from the payroll, and the tax filings. There’s Henry but there’s also Angie Rice, and I know she works here because her desk is right over fucking there.’ She pointed. ‘That’s only two of them, but there must be more we don’t know about. Luke must be paying them, but not on the books. Under the table. Maybe cash. Maybe from his own money, I don’t know. Then he doesn’t have to file payroll taxes for them – he saves that money for the company. Federal taxes, Medicare, Social Security, he wouldn’t have to pay any of it if their wages aren’t reported. He’s been doing this for months, maybe even years, since hetook over all the finance stuff.’ She swallowed, pointing to the screen. ‘Insurance fraud too. Because he’s misreporting the number of employees to their workers’ comp insurance provider. And if one of those unreported employees doesn’t have workers’ comp, it means that if something happened at work, if they got injured, they wouldn’t have access to healthcare or salary compensation.’

‘Wait,’ Billy said, catching on, building a picture of his own.

‘Remember that prick Jimmy, the foreman?’ Jet said. ‘He mentioned there was an accident on North Street. That a roof collapsed, injuring the worker who was still inside. And the project was delayed and Luke had to change his plans.’

‘Do you think that worker was –’

‘– I think that was Henry.’ Jet nodded. ‘I don’t think he got drunk and fell off a wall in March, blinding himself in one eye and shattering his kneecap. I think it happened while he was at work, for Mason Construction, working on Andrew Smith’s old house when a roof collapsed on him.’

‘Fuck,’ Billy said, his mouth staying open, long after the word.

‘And Henry would have been fucked,’ Jet said. ‘He would have had to pay for all of it himself, the hospital stay, the surgeries, the treatments. That could have cost, like, tens of thousands of dollars.’

‘Maybe more,’ Billy said. ‘And remember, he said he needed another surgery now, to save his other eye, but he couldn’t afford it.’

Jet nodded, adding that to the picture as well. ‘Luke would be fucked too, the one actually committing the crime here. If Henry ever told anyone, if anyone found out what Luke …’ She swallowed, and by the look in Billy’s eyes, she could tell his mind had gone to the same dark place.

‘Does this mean –’ he started. ‘Would this give Henry amotive? If Luke did this to him, if he hated him for it, could he have –’

‘– killed me, to hurt Luke, or send him a warning, or blackmail him for the money he desperately needs?’ Jet completed their shared thought. ‘I don’t know.’

‘And he worked on the North Street site,’ Billy thought aloud. ‘Maybe he kept track of the work after – maybe he knew about the foundations going in the morning after Halloween. Fuck.’

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