Chapter 7 - The Report Nobody Read
“He had a heart attack.”
Ruiz sat across from me.
“Who told you?”
“The emergency room.”
“Was there an autopsy?”
“Mom said they didn’t need one.”
Ruiz nodded slowly.
“Your father was found with a head injury.”
“He fell.”
“That was the conclusion.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying the first officer at the scene noted bruising on his wrists. That detail didn’t make it into the final summary.”
My stomach tightened.
“You think someone held him?”
“I think the file deserves another look.”
Outside the glass partition, Luca sat alone beneath a television nobody was watching.
Three years ago, my father had died.
Three years ago, Luca had crashed.
I had never put those dates next to each other.
Ruiz turned another page.
“Your father made a complaint the morning before his death. Someone had followed him home.”
“Against who?”
“He didn’t have a name. He described a gray SUV.”
I looked at Nico’s phone on the table.
The picture from the storage facility showed a gray SUV disappearing beneath a streetlight.
Ruiz saw where I was looking.
“We’re checking it.”
A nurse brought me water.
I couldn’t hold the cup steady.
Luca entered after Ruiz stepped outside.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“You didn’t know.”
“That doesn’t make your father any less dead.”
I looked at him.
For once, someone wasn’t asking me to make an awful truth easier to hear.
“Michael knew,” I said.
“Yes.”
“And he let my mother spend three years blaming herself for not making Dad see a doctor.”
Luca lowered his eyes.
“I’m going to ask him every question you want answered.”
“No.”
He looked up.
“I’ll ask him.”
Michael arrived under police supervision that afternoon.
He looked older without the expensive dinner jacket.
I set the repair order between us.
“Why did my father give you his toolbox?”
Michael swallowed.
“He trusted me.”
“Then why is he dead?”
He pressed his palms against his knees.
“I was supposed to give the evidence to Luca.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Frank sent me a photograph of my daughter outside her school.”
I stared at him.
Michael’s voice broke.
“I hid it.”
“And Vanessa?”
He looked toward the door.
“She knew I’d kept it. She said marrying her would prove I wasn’t going to talk.”
I leaned forward.
“Did she threaten your daughter, too?”
Michael didn’t answer.
Ruiz entered, holding her phone.
“The drive has audio,” she said.
May you like
Then she looked at Luca.
“And you’re going to want to sit down for this.”
