"Not all at once. Look, this first shipment in January 2018 is the chassis tub. Dead weight, no identifying markings on the customs form, listed as industrial composite component. This one in March is consistent with the engine block and drivetrain assembly. These two in 2019 are bodywork panels.
Cole leaned over the documents. He had somewhere to store it. He has a property in Nevada, or had. It's been sold. I found the title transfer through a property record search.
She pulled a separate sheet from the second box. He sold it in 2021, two years after the last shipment. Cole looked at the property record. Remote Nevada County. Undeveloped land with a single structure.
Sold for cash in February 2021 to a numbered holding company that resolved through three layers of corporate registration to nothing traceable. So, he stored it for three years, then sold the property, Cole said. The car was on site when he sold. That's my read. The buyers got the property and the car, and then something went wrong.
Victoria spread her hands over the documents. The fire, the salvage auction. Someone tried to finish what Marsh started, getting rid of it, and couldn't complete it. Or decided a fire-damaged wreck at a Nevada salvage lot was disposal enough. Cole thought about the burned door.
The way the fire had traveled, fast and directional, originating at the driver's side engine access. Not an accident. Too specific to be anything but deliberate. They needed it gone, he said. Not for money.
For it to stop existing. Which means whatever the car proves about the project, about what was built, about the decisions made during that period, is something someone is still afraid of. She met his eyes. This isn't just about a rare prototype, Cole. There's a reason they want it to disappear.
Cole sat back. The kitchen was quiet except for the distant sound of Emma's book being turned in the living room. "The corporate restructuring," he said, "in 2017. What happened to the company, the one that originally ran the project? " Victoria's expression shifted slightly, something careful moving behind it. "It was acquired," she said.