Chapter 4 - THE ACCIDENT THAT WASN'T AN ACCIDENT
Fay Delacroix had spent twelve years believing her mother's death was a tragic accident.
A rainy highway.
A truck crossing the center line.
A collision so violent that investigators couldn't reconstruct every detail.
Marguerite died before the ambulance arrived.
Fay was sixteen.
And the world she understood disappeared overnight.
Now Rafferty Cain was standing in Mrs. Odette's catering office, asking whether Fay would agree to discuss her mother's death.
Fay stared at him.
“Why?”
“Because I have reason to believe the original investigation may have missed something.”
Her stomach tightened.
“What kind of something?”
Rafferty hesitated.
“I don't want to give you conclusions we can't prove.”
That surprised her.
Most powerful men she'd encountered spoke as though uncertainty were an insult.
He continued.
“My attorneys are helping review old financial records connected to St. Augustine's.”
Fay looked down.
“My mother worked there years before she died.”
“I know.”
“Then why would someone care about her now?”
Rafferty swallowed.
“Because she may have kept evidence.”
Fay's hands began trembling.
For a moment, she couldn't speak.
Then she asked, “Did your father hurt my mother?”
Rafferty looked devastated.
“I don't know.”
She studied him.
He didn't look away.
That mattered.
“Then find out,” she whispered.
“I will.”
That afternoon, Fay returned home.
Josie was sitting at the kitchen table with Mrs. Lottie, the elderly neighbor who cared for her after school.
A new blue paper boat rested beside her crayons.
When Josie saw Fay, her face brightened.
She hurried forward and wrapped her arms around her mother's waist.
Fay knelt carefully.
Her knees still ached.
Josie touched her cheek.
Then made the sign they'd practiced for home.
Fay smiled and signed back.
I'm home.
Later, after Josie fell asleep, Fay opened the old cedar chest beneath her bed.
It contained Marguerite's photographs.
A nurse's uniform.
A faded Bible.
And a stack of letters bound with green ribbon.
Fay had read most of them.
But one envelope remained sealed.
Across the front, her mother had written:
For Fay, when the past finally finds you.
Fay's breath caught.
She opened it.
The first paragraph made her eyes fill.
My darling girl,
If someone from the Cain family comes looking for me, do not assume they are your enemy.
The second paragraph made her hands shake.
There was a boy at St. Augustine's.
His name was Rafferty.
I promised him I would come back.
Fay pressed her hand against her mouth.
Then she read the final line.
There is something about that boy's birth that his father never told him.
And beneath it was a name.
May you like
EVELYN CAIN.
The woman Rafferty had been told died giving birth to him.
