"She's already dead, don't mention Lila or the transfer to the cops."
Julian's hurried whisper scraped out of my cracked phone speaker, hanging in the sterile air of the safe room.
I slammed my palm flat against the metal table. The sharp crack echoed off the concrete walls.
"Log it," I told Nora, my voice dropping to a harsh rasp. "Put that audio file directly into the federal evidence locker."
Nora picked up her clipboard, her expression unreadable. "You don't want to hear the rest? Maybe Ethan tries to defend you."
"Do it," I demanded, shoving the phone across the table. "Do not give them the benefit of the doubt. Do not let anyone excuse what they just did."
Nora scooped up the device. She plugged it into a thick black terminal on the wall, then tapped a few keys on her keyboard. The live news feed on the flat-screen monitor vanished. A shaky, timestamped video replaced it. Police bodycam footage.
"This was recorded forty minutes ago at the precinct," Nora said.
On the screen, Julian and Ethan sat in a cramped evidence room. A detective with a graying mustache stood across from them, holding the plastic bag with my platinum wedding band.
"Yes, that is my wife's ring," Julian said on the video. He dabbed the corner of his eye with a tissue. "But you haven't found her body. She could have swum to shore. She could be wandering out there."
"We are dredging the river, Mr. Cross," the detective replied gently. "But the current is strong. You need to prepare yourselves."
Ethan leaned forward in his plastic chair. He wore his Vale Academy blazer, the crest stitched in gold thread. He looked annoyed, not grieving.
"You don't know my mother," Ethan told the detective, crossing his arms. "She does things like this for attention. She probably parked the car by the cliff, tossed the ring in, and walked off. She just wants us to panic."
The detective frowned. "Son, the vehicle fell eighty feet into a river."
"She's having an emotional breakdown," Ethan insisted, his voice rising with irritation. "She blew up my phone fourteen times last week just because I didn't answer a text fast enough. She always tries to control us. This is just her punishing us for wanting our own space."
I stared at the screen. A cold, heavy weight settled in the pit of my stomach.
"Control," I repeated, the word tasting like ash in my mouth.
"Is he right?" Nora asked, leaning against the wall. "Were you punishing them?"
I turned my head, glaring at the federal agent. "Four years ago, someone left a photograph of Ethan inside his high school locker. A red cross was drawn over his face in permanent marker. The note attached gave a seventy-two-hour warning."
Nora stopped typing. She watched my hands curl into fists.
"I pulled him off the varsity track team that same day," I continued, the words spilling out fast and hard. "I drove him to school, walked him to his classroom, and sat in my car outside the gates until the final bell rang. I did that for twenty-one days straight while Julian was away on a golf trip."
"You made yourself the visible target," Nora concluded softly.
I had also made a copy of every report. The school incident number, the detective's card, the grainy hallway footage showing a hooded figure near Ethan's locker. Julian had skimmed the folder once and called the warning an attempt to scare him during a contract dispute. Then he had left for the golf retreat anyway.
"I changed our routes every morning," I continued. "I moved Ethan's practice gear into my trunk so no one could predict when he would leave campus. I asked the school to rotate the security officer at the west gate. Ethan thought I was embarrassing him. Julian thought I was overreacting."
Nora's expression hardened. "And the threat stopped."
"On the twenty-second day," I said. "The person watching him realized they would have to go through me first."
"I took the crosshairs off my son's back and painted them on mine," I said, my voice cracking on the last word. "And he calls it suffocating. He tells the police I am a control freak who deserves to be ignored."
"He is nineteen," Nora pointed out. "Teenagers lack perspective."
"He is old enough to know I was bleeding in a hospital bed," I shot back. "He is old enough to sit in a police station and use my love as an alibi for his father's mistress."
Nora stepped away from the wall. She slid a thick, bound document across the steel table. The cover bore the seal of the state highway patrol.
"Accident inspection report," Nora said. "The dive team managed to recover the front axle and the braking system before the current swept the rest of the chassis away."
I kept my hands at my sides. "Read it to me."
"Watch the screen," Nora instructed.
On the monitor, the detective stepped out of the frame for a brief moment. He returned holding a manila folder, setting it on the table in front of Julian and Ethan.
"We pulled the vehicle's critical components from the wreckage," the detective said, his tone shifting from sympathetic to strictly professional.
Julian stopped dabbing his eyes. He sat up straighter. "Mechanics?"
"I told you, she staged it," Ethan scoffed, reaching for the folder. He flipped it open.
I watched my son's face. I waited for the annoyance to remain, for him to roll his eyes and push the photos away.
Instead, Ethan froze.
His jaw unclenched. The arrogant tilt of his chin vanished. He stared at the glossy eight-by-ten photographs inside the file. His pale fingers trembled against the paper. For the first time since the recording began, the steady stream of complaints stopped.
"Dad," Ethan whispered on the video. He pushed the folder toward Julian.
Julian refused to look at it. He kept his eyes fixed on the detective. "What are we looking at here, Officer?"
The detective tapped the top photograph.
"This wasn't a normal accident," the detective said, his voice echoing through the safe room speakers. "Both brake lines were intentionally cut."
