It was addressed to me.
It offered a private settlement.
No admission of wrongdoing.
A sum of money.
In exchange, Ava would recant her statement and I would withdraw my cooperation with the investigation.
I read it at Patricia’s office.
When I finished, I set it on her desk.
“No,” I said.
Patricia picked up her pen.
“I’ll draft the response.”
“Make it short,” I said.
She almost smiled.
“I will.”
On the way home, Ava asked what the letter had said.
“He offered money to make it stop,” I told her.
She was quiet for a moment.
“What did you say?”
“No.”
She looked out the window.
After a long pause, she said: “Chloe would have said the same thing.”
I didn’t answer.
But I reached over and put my hand briefly on hers.
That was enough.
The accident reconstruction took eleven days.
I learned more about that road than I ever wanted to know — the grade of the curve, the drainage pattern, the tire marks still faintly visible in the shoulder after five years.
