Page 36 of Logan’s Way

Not highway patrol. Not state police. The local sheriff’s department—one deputy directing traffic, another standing by a cruiser, lights rotating lazily. Professional. Calm. Routine traffic management for some unspecified reason.

The deputy directing traffic waved vehicles through the single open lane, sending them past the blocked exit and toward the next one, five miles up. No explanation. No signs indicating what required the closure. Just smooth, efficient rerouting.

Angus slowed, rolled his window down, and had his badge ready. “What’s the situation?”

The deputy glanced at the badge, then at Angus. “Road maintenance on the exit ramp. Should be clear in a few hours.”

“I need to get to the industrial district.”

“You’ll have to use the next exit and double back. This one’s closed until we get clearance.”

Angus looked past the deputy. The exit ramp lay open and empty—no equipment, no workers, no visible reason for closure. Just orange cones and a roadblock preventing access.

“Doesn’t look like active maintenance,” Angus said carefully.

“Orders came down this morning. Sometimes they shut things down before crews arrive.” The deputy’s tone was professional, final. “Next exit’s five miles up. You can loop back on Route 202.”

Cars were piling up behind Angus now. The deputy’s attention shifted to keeping traffic moving. Angus eased forward, following the flow away from the exit he needed, away from the storage facility, away from his intended destination.

Scout shifted in the passenger seat, sensing something in Angus’s stillness.

Five miles to the next exit. Then another fifteen minutes doubling back on surface roads. By the time Angus reached the storage facility, whatever window he’d had to sort through his mother’s belongings would be gone. The office closed at five. He’d be lucky to make it by six.

Except when Angus reached the alternate route, there was another delay. This time, an accident—two vehicles blocking the intersection, emergency responders managing traffic, creating backups that stretched for blocks. Not a roadblock. Just unfortunate timing that added another twenty minutes to the detour.

By the time Angus reached the storage facility, the office was dark. Closed. A sign on the door indicated hours: Monday–Friday, 9–5. Weekends by appointment only.

He’d missed it by forty minutes.

Scout looked at him, then at the closed facility door, then back at Angus. The dog had been in the truck for more than two hours, expecting a quick stop and then home. Instead, they’d driven in circles and accomplished nothing.

Angus sat in the parking lot and thought about the roadblock. About the precision of timing—the exit closed exactly when he needed it, alternate routes delayed by an accident that may or may not have been coincidental. About the deputy who’d seen his badge and hadn’t wavered, hadn’t offered professional courtesy, simply rerouted traffic in accordance with orders.

Orders that happened to prevent Angus from accessing a storage unit containing his mother’s belongings.

Belongings that might include documents, records, personal effects from decades of raising two boys alone after fleeing Scotland. Things Moira would have kept. Things that might contain information about Logan that official records wouldn’t show.

The kind of information someone might want to keep Angus from accessing.

He pulled out his phone and called the storage facility’s office number. He got voicemail and left a message about rescheduling. Then he sat in the darkening parking lot and felt the edges of something larger than administrative holds and database restrictions.

Someone had known where he was going, had anticipated his route, had arranged for a roadblock with enough lead time to position deputies—a delay that looked legitimate, official, routine.

Professional containment had escalated to active prevention.

Scout leaned against the center console, warm and solid. Angus ran his hand through the dog’s fur and started the truck. The drive home would take ninety minutes. Time to think about what had just happened, and what it meant.

* * *

Angus opened his front door and Scout eagerly pushed past him into the house, the thirsty pup heading straight for his water bowl after hours confined to the truck. The house was dark, quiet, exactly as he’d left it.

Except something felt different.

Not obviously wrong. Not disturbed. Just… present. The way a room feels when someone has just left it—the air slightly displaced, the silence newly settled.

Angus stood in the doorway and scanned the kitchen. Everything was in its place. Coffee mug where he’d left it. Notebook on the table. Scout’s bowl in the corner. Nothing moved. Nothing missing.

He walked through the house systematically. The living room was undisturbed and the guest bedroom—the one where his investigation wall had been—looked exactly as he’d left it. The filing cabinet was still locked, desk organized. Nothing obviously touched.