It was Porter, recorded days before he died, gaunt and hollow-eyed, a ghost of the man I loved.

“Jenny,” his thin voice crackled.

“If you’re watching this, my time ran out.

It means I couldn’t stop the rot.” He laid the whole thing out.

Twenty-three years ago the company hadn’t been one man’s; it had been four partners — Denton Ashgrave, Rufus Hansen, Errol Brannock, and Jaime Jimenez.

Desperate to keep the business alive, the four had agreed to run one illegal shipment through a mountain pass in the dark.

It went wrong.