Chapter 6: What Marcus Wanted
The detective Frank called was a woman named Carla Reyes.
She came to Frank's office that afternoon, and she was nothing like I expected.
She was small, unhurried, and she asked questions the way a surgeon makes incisions — precise, without wasted movement.
She sat across from me with a notepad and didn't open it once.
"Tell me about the night of Elena's accident," she said.
"Not what the police report said.
What you remember."
"I was at a conference in Portland.
I got the call at eleven-forty.
The officer said she'd gone off Route 9 around ten-fifteen.
Black ice.
Single vehicle."
"Did you question that at the time?"
"No.
Elena knew that road.
She drove it twice a week.
But I didn't—" I stopped.
"I was in shock.
I didn't question anything."
"When did Vanessa come into your life?"
"She reached out about four months after Elena d*ed.
Said she was a friend of a colleague.
We had coffee.
She was kind.
She was patient with the children." I heard how it sounded.
"She knew exactly what I needed."
Reyes wrote nothing down.
"Did Elena ever mention being afraid of anyone?
Any conflict?
Any threats?"
"She mentioned tension at work.
Nothing specific." I paused.
"She did say once, about two months before she d*ed, that she felt like someone had been in her car.
Things moved.
She thought she was imagining it."
Reyes looked at me steadily.
"She wasn't imagining it."
The words landed without drama.
That made them worse.
"The paint transfer on the rear bumper," I said.
"I've already requested the impound photographs from the county.
The car was released to salvage eight months after the accident.
It's gone." She said it without apology.
"But paint transfer analysis was never conducted because the accident was ruled single-vehicle.
If there's a secondary vehicle involved, we find it another way."
"How?"
"Marcus Hale owned a dark blue Audi A6 at the time of the accident.
He sold it five weeks later.
Private sale, cash." She paused.
"People who sell cars for cash five weeks after an accident are not usually in a hurry for the money."
My hands were flat on the table.
I didn't remember putting them there.
"He was on that road," I said.
"I don't have enough to say that yet.
But I have enough to keep pulling." She finally picked up her pen.
"I need the folder.
The originals."
I had brought it in from the car.
I slid it across the table.
She opened it and went through each page slowly, without expression.
When she reached the photograph of Elena's car with the circled bumper, she stopped.
"Who circled this?"
"I don't know.
It was already in the folder when I found it."
"Elena circled it," Reyes said.
Not a question.
"How do you know?"
"Because she hid the folder.
She built a case." Reyes looked up.
"Your wife knew she was in danger.
She was collecting evidence." She closed the folder carefully.
"She was trying to protect your children."
The office went very quiet.
Frank, who had been sitting to my left without speaking, set his pen down.
I looked at the folder in Reyes's hands and I thought about Elena driving Route 9 at ten o'clock at night, four phone calls from Vanessa behind her, a dark car somewhere in her mirrors, a folder hidden under a floor she hoped I would one day find.
"She left it for me," I said.
"Yes," Reyes said.
"She did."
My phone buzzed on the table.
Unknown number.
I turned it over.
*You have until Friday.
After that, I go to your business partners with the Crestline documents.
Your choice.*
Reyes saw my face.
"Show me."
I handed her the phone.
She read it.
Then she looked at Frank.
"He just added extortion to the list," she said.
"That's the second mistake."
May you like
She didn't smile when she said it.
But something in her posture changed — the way a door changes when the lock finally catches.
