Chương 23: Chapter 22: Within the Margins

A day later, the founding members of Breakwater Holdings met once again in their new conference room. This time, a newly built table sat at the center of the space, accompanied by a mismatched set of chairs salvaged from around the city instead of old rotting barrels of pitch. The room was really starting to come together, and the same could be said for the state of the entire building.

It was beginning to feel like a real guild hall rather than a decrepit old boathouse praying for one more storm so it could finally surrender its long struggle against the canal. Jack, Aldric, and Kael had even chosen to move into the building now that enough rooms had been roughed in. Seraphine, on the other hand, chose to keep her loft deeper in the city for now. As Kael finished his recollection, Jack shifted forward slightly in his chair.

"So, what happened with the rest of the shipment?"

"I don't know. By the time I returned for night shift, it was already compiled. I checked the logs. They did find more losses, but it seemed pretty negligible compared to the size of the entire shipment."

"Mhmm. Well, it's something to keep an eye on anyway. Good work, Kael," Jack said.

"Why?" Jack looked confused by the question. To him, it had been obvious, but seeing the expressions on the others made it clear that it apparently wasn't.

"With a con this big, at these stakes and this level of maneuvering, it's often the ordinary and accounted-for that ends up being the culprit. If it were obvious, then anyone could figure it out." The team looked at Jack like he had suddenly grown three heads.

"Amateurs try to hide their thefts inside accidents and the unaccounted-for, but that always leads to attention and, more often than not, an investigation. So instead, you look for patterns inside situations people already account for every day because then they don't raise any red flags. It's simple logic, really," Jack said while folding his notes back up.

"Oh yeah, that makes sense," Aldric said.

"No it doesn't," Seraphine shot back, nearly shouting.

"Don't pretend like you understood any more of that than I did." This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

"Yes, I did," Aldric said emphatically while staring her down. Kael squirmed uncomfortably in his chair.

"I sure didn't. If you can't look for the obvious and can only focus on the mundane and regular, then how do you narrow anything down? It all looks the same to me."

"Al, since you're so well-versed in this, why don't you explain it to him?" Seraphine asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, you see, Kael…" Aldric began slowly.

"You look at everyday items… er, well, things… situations with a critical eye and… in doing so, you find what's uncommon in the common…" He glanced toward Jack desperately.

"Isn't that, right?" Jack smiled widely at the question, unsure and awkward as that explanation was it wasn't far off. Jack decided to take pity on him and bailed him out.

"Absolutely, Aldric. Couldn't have said it better. In this instance it's common to see variable losses, so it's uncommon to see consistent ones even if it's within the expected result. Consistency of result in an operation with this many variables points to it being manufactured." Seraphine glared daggers at him like he had just betrayed her. He simply chuckled quietly to himself and continued his explanation.

"These types of plays are always hidden in the margins. If you're expecting a fifteen percent loss of goods and see fourteen percent, it doesn't raise any red flags because it's expected. But when the actual losses are only five percent, which is possible but never accounted for, that's where there's money to be made."

"Exactly," Aldric said with a smug smile that nearly pushed Seraphine over the edge. Fortunately for him, Kael's genuine interest came to his rescue this time.

"But how do you notice those patterns?"

"That's the tricky part. Sometimes it's luck. Sometimes you get tipped off. Sometimes you just get a feeling."

"But what if that feeling is wrong?" Jack shrugged.

"Then so be it. You can always try again tomorrow. You don't fail by being wrong, you fail by giving up or not trying." He could tell that Kael was struggling with that distinction.

"Take this for example. Do you remember the caravan I asked you about the other day at breakfast?" Kael nodded.

"Of course. You asked me why a caravan was turned away at the beginning of the day, and I told you the foreman said it had gone to the wrong warehouse."

"Precisely. Happens every day. Completely ordinary. But something about it felt off, so I investigated further. Turns out it was delivered to a warehouse a half dozen blocks from yours."

"And?" Seraphine asked, her patience beginning to wear thin. The stress of running this place largely on her own was clearly starting to get to her.

"I looked into it, and it turns out the warehouse in question belongs to Edison Albriecht himself. Through a few shell companies, of course, but I checked with the city registrar's office. It all checks out." Kael nodded slowly in understanding.

"So, your feeling was wrong."

"Not quite. It turns out our dear Mr. Albriecht didn't buy it. In fact, until this morning, he didn't even know it existed." That got everyone's attention.

"Which is why I had him pick up this," Jack said, holding up a folded piece of paper.

"It's a copy of the title to the building, along with a note explaining our presence. That way we don't get in trouble." Aldric was the one to interrupt this time.

"In trouble for what?" Jack smiled faintly.

"Breaking and entering, of course."