Chapter 6 - The Night Beside Route 9
Ten years earlier, Delaney Shaw had been sixteen and furious with her mother.
That was what she remembered most clearly.
Not the rain.
Not the wreck.
Not the blood.
The argument.
Elaine had refused to let Delaney attend a party because the roads were dangerous.
Delaney accused her mother of controlling everything.
Elaine accused Delaney of being sixteen.
Delaney said that was not an argument.
Elaine said it was legally quite a strong one.
Then they drove to the pharmacy because Juny, only four at the time, had a fever.
On the way home, headlights flashed beyond the guardrail.
A car struck a tree.
Elaine screamed.
Delaney was already opening her door.
“Stay here!”
“Mom, someone crashed!”
“We call 911.”
“We can do both.”
That sentence would become a family joke later.
Before life became less funny.
Delaney ran through rain.
The driver was dead.
She knew immediately.
The passenger was alive.
Barely.
Allesio Corsetti looked nothing like the man he would become.
His hair was longer.
His face younger.
Blood soaked his shirt.
A piece of metal pinned his leg.
“Go,” he told her.
“An ambulance is coming.”
“Go.”
“I heard you.”
“Then listen.”
“No.”
Even half-conscious, he stared at her.
“Who are you?”
“Nobody.”
“That’s not a name.”
“You’re bleeding too much to flirt.”
He laughed once.
Then coughed blood.
Delaney climbed onto the passenger side.
The door was crushed.
She used the tire iron.
Glass exploded inward.
A shard opened her wrist.
She screamed.
Allesio tried pushing her away.
“Enough.”
“No.”
“Kid—”
“Stop calling me kid.”
“Then tell me your name.”
She ignored him.
Gasoline smelled strongly.
Smoke came from the engine.
Elaine arrived.
She saw the fuel.
“Delaney!”
Together, they pulled Allesio through the broken window.
The wreck caught fire less than two minutes later.
Police arrived.
Then paramedics.
Before they loaded him into the ambulance, Allesio caught Delaney’s wrist.
“You saved me.”
“You’re welcome.”
“What’s your name?”
She looked toward her mother.
Elaine was speaking with police.
For reasons Delaney never fully understood, she said, “Doesn’t matter.”
Allesio pressed an old silver coin into her hand.
“It matters to me.”
She kept the coin.
For years.
Then during one of their moves after her father left, it disappeared.
Or so she believed.
Ten years later, sitting beside Juny’s hospital bed while her sister underwent preoperative testing, Delaney remembered everything.
The coin.
The smell of fuel.
Allesio’s face.
The way he had looked at her when she refused to leave.
Juny watched her.
“You’re thinking about Mafia Batman.”
“Please stop calling him that.”
“Corsetti?”
“Yes.”
“Mafia Batman is better.”
“He is not a superhero.”
“Never said superhero.”
“That is literally Batman.”
Juny grinned.
Delaney looked toward the test room.
“You nervous?”
“No.”
“Liar.”
“A little.”
Delaney took her hand.
Juny’s smile faded.
“What if we don’t get the money?”
“We will.”
“How?”
“We’re close.”
The fundraiser total had reached fourteen thousand.
Enough for most of the deposit.
Not enough for everything after.
Juny knew.
“You’re working too much.”
“I’m okay.”
“You fell asleep standing yesterday.”
“I was leaning.”
“You were asleep.”
“Resting my eyes vertically.”
Juny rolled hers.
“I could postpone.”
“No.”
“Laney—”
“No.”
The word came sharper than intended.
Delaney softened.
“You heard Dr. Ragavan. We don’t postpone.”
Juny stared at her.
“Mom would hate what you’re doing to yourself.”
Delaney looked away.
“That was below the belt.”
“True.”
Then Juny squeezed her hand.
“But accurate.”
Across town, Allesio sat inside Corsetti Shipping headquarters.
Marco placed a file on his desk.
“You’re not going to like this.”
“Then why are you smiling?”
“Because when you don’t like things, other people become entertaining.”
Allesio opened it.
Delaney’s father.
Calvin Shaw.
Alive.
Living in Florida.
Former collections agent.
Multiple arrests.
One sealed domestic-violence complaint from fourteen years earlier.
Allesio closed the file.
“Why did you find him?”
“You asked for background on the Howerins and Shaw family.”
“I told Delaney I wouldn’t look for him.”
“You didn’t. I did.”
Allesio glared.
Marco stopped smiling.
“What do you want done?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Nothing.”
Marco stared.
“You’ve changed.”
“Apparently.”
Then another page caught Allesio’s eye.
Calvin Shaw had worked briefly for Howerin Asset Recovery.
He looked again.
“When?”
“Same year Elaine discovered the foundation fraud.”
Allesio sat forward.
“What exactly did he do?”
“Collections. Pressure campaigns. Evictions.”
“Who hired him?”
“Howerin subsidiary.”
A cold thought formed.
“Did Randolph know Calvin was Elaine Shaw’s ex-husband?”
“Unknown.”
Allesio called Ortiz.
She disliked hearing from him.
She disliked more what he told her.
Within forty-eight hours, detectives found an old payroll file showing Calvin had received an unexplained $30,000 bonus shortly after Elaine withdrew her complaint.
When Delaney learned, she went silent.
“My father helped threaten my mother?”
Ortiz answered carefully.
“We know he received money.”
“For what?”
“We don’t know.”
“I do.”
Delaney stood.
“He knew where we lived. He knew my school. He knew what scared Mom.”
Allesio watched her.
She suddenly understood something else.
“My father came back once.”
“When?” Ortiz asked.
“After the break-in.”
Memory sharpened.
“He told Mom she needed to stop ‘making problems for rich men.’”
Ruth Anne whispered, “Dear God.”
Delaney looked sick.
“My mother didn’t withdraw the complaint because some stranger followed me.”
She stared at the floor.
“She withdrew because my father threatened us for Randolph Howerin.”
Allesio stepped closer.
She raised a hand.
“Don’t.”
He stopped.
“I know what you’re thinking.”
“You don’t.”
“Yes, I do.”
She looked directly at him.
“No violence.”
His voice was quiet.
“I remember.”
Delaney’s eyes filled.
“My father hurt us. Randolph paid him. Mom got sick two years later. She spent her last years thinking she failed.”
“You know she didn’t.”
“Do I?”
“Yes.”
Allesio’s answer came so quickly she looked at him.
“You were sixteen and still ran toward a burning car because somebody needed help.”
He stepped closer.
“People do not learn that from nothing.”
Delaney began crying.
Not loudly.
Not dramatically.
She simply folded.
Allesio did not touch her immediately.
He waited.
Then she stepped forward herself.
Her forehead rested against his chest.
His arms came around her.
Carefully.
Like he was holding something strong enough to survive and precious enough not to test.
May you like
Across the diner, Ruth Anne silently turned the OPEN sign to CLOSED.
No one objected.
