Chapter 7 - THE CRASH STOPPED LOOKING LIKE AN ACCIDENT
Dominic remembered almost nothing before the crash.
Dinner.
A meeting downtown.
Rain.
Headlights reflecting off concrete.
Then his driver, Mateo Ruiz, shouting his name.
Metal.
Darkness.
Mateo survived with a broken arm.
He returned to work six weeks later.
Dominic called him to the estate.
“Did I drink that night?”
“No.”
“Medication?”
“Not that I saw.”
“Did anyone bring me anything?”
Mateo thought.
“Coffee.”
“Who?”
Arthur’s assistant.
Not Arthur.
A woman named Celia Crane.
She had resigned after Dominic’s accident to “care for family in Arizona.”
Vincent checked.
No Arizona address.
Celia now lived in Wisconsin.
Then security footage from the restaurant surfaced.
Celia handed Dominic a sealed travel mug before he left.
Dominic drank from it in the car.
Forty minutes later, Mateo noticed Dominic becoming unusually quiet.
“You asked me twice what exit we were taking.”
“I never do that.”
“No.”
Then the crash.
Police had blamed hydroplaning after a delivery van changed lanes abruptly.
The van driver disappeared before full civil deposition.
Insurance settled.
Case closed.
Now Vincent traced the van.
Registered to a subcontractor partly owned by North Meridian.
Arthur’s network again.
Still not proof of deliberate collision.
Too many legitimate business relationships overlapped.
Then the van’s telematics surfaced from an old fleet backup.
It had accelerated seconds before moving into Dominic’s lane.
Not conclusive.
But suspicious.
More importantly, a payment of $25,000 reached the driver’s brother days later from a North Meridian consulting account.
Dominic felt the old version of himself waking.
The one who solved betrayal violently.
He stood.
Pain shot through his leg.
Clare watched from the doorway.
“Don’t.”
Dominic looked at her.
She had no idea what he was thinking.
Or perhaps she did.
“If you make Arthur disappear,” Clare said, “then we’ll never know what happened to Aaron.”
That stopped him.
Not morality from a stranger.
A practical truth.
Dead men answered nothing.
Dominic sat.
“Vincent.”
“Yes?”
“No one touches Arthur.”
Vincent nodded.
“Or Sloane.”
Another nod.
“We document everything.”
Clare exhaled.
Then Mateo said:
“There’s something I never told you.”
Dominic turned.
After the crash, while Dominic was unconscious, Arthur came to the hospital before police finished interviewing Mateo.
Arthur asked a strange question.
“Did Dominic say anything before impact?”
Mateo thought he meant last words.
“He asked twice.”
Arthur then told him:
“Don’t confuse him later with details he won’t remember.”
At the time, Mateo thought Arthur was protecting Dominic from trauma.
Now it sounded like instruction.
Then Mateo remembered something else.
Before the crash, Dominic had received a phone call.
He answered through the car speakers.
A man said:
“We found the Rowan file.”
Dominic frowned.
“What Rowan file?”
Mateo shook his head.
“You said the same thing.”
Then the caller replied:
“The Halcyon technician. Aaron Rowan.”
Clare’s knees almost gave way.
May you like
Dominic had been told Aaron’s name the night of the crash.
Someone had been trying to bring the dead technician’s evidence directly to him.
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