Chapter 4 - THE MAN WHO HIT MY CAR KNEW MY HUSBAND
Rebecca refused to call it attempted murder.
So did the police.
So did Samuel.
I appreciated their caution.
I hated it too.
Derek Sloan could have crashed into me accidentally.
People who worked for the same company knew each other.
A vendor employee knowing Julian wasn't proof of conspiracy.
Then the accident report revealed something strange.
Derek claimed he had been driving home.
But his home was forty miles in the opposite direction.
His explanation?
He had gotten lost.
A regional sales manager.
Using GPS.
Got lost.
At exactly the intersection where I was driving.
My chest tightened.
Then police found another detail.
Derek had called Julian seven times during the month before the accident.
Julian had never mentioned knowing him personally.
The detective assigned to the crash reopened the case.
His name was Marcus Bell.
He came to the hospital.
“Mrs. Bennett, I need you to walk me through that day.”
I did.
Breakfast.
School drop-off.
Laundry.
Hospital appointment for Julian's mother.
Home.
Julian arriving early.
His briefcase.
The folder.
“What did you see?”
Detective Bell asked.
“Payments.”
“To your husband?”
“I don't know.”
“Names?”
“Meridian.”
“Anything else?”
I closed my eyes.
Numbers.
Dates.
Then one phrase.
“Market development fee.”
Samuel looked up.
“That appears in Bennett Consulting records.”
Bell wrote it down.
“What did you do?”
“I took pictures.”
“Why?”
“Because something felt wrong.”
“Did your husband see you?”
“I don't think so.”
Then memory.
Julian standing in the kitchen doorway.
“What are you doing?”
I had jumped.
“Nothing.”
He looked at the folder.
Then at my phone.
My stomach turned.
“He knew.”
Bell didn't react.
“What happened next?”
“He asked where I was going.”
“Did you tell him?”
“Grocery store.”
“Which one?”
“Yes.”
“Did he know your route?”
“Of course.”
Eleven years.
He knew everything.
Bell asked:
“Did he call anyone after you left?”
“I don't know.”
Phone records answered.
Julian called Derek Sloan six minutes after I drove away.
The call lasted forty-three seconds.
Derek's vehicle struck mine twenty-eight minutes later.
The room became silent.
Still not proof.
But no longer coincidence anyone could ignore.
Then Julian called Derek again.
Three minutes after the crash.
Before police notified Julian.
My blood went cold.
“How would he know?”
I whispered.
Bell's face remained neutral.
“We're investigating.”
My hands began shaking.
Julian arrived at the hospital forty-seven minutes after the accident.
He told police he learned from an emergency contact call.
But the hospital hadn't called him until thirty-two minutes after the collision.
He had called Derek before that.
Then something worse.
My phone was recovered from the vehicle.
Julian took custody of it at the hospital.
The photographs disappeared that night.
I stared at Detective Bell.
“My husband tried to kill me.”
“We don't know that.”
“He knew.”
“We know there are questions.”
“Questions?”
Rebecca touched my hand.
“Audrey.”
I stopped.
Evidence.
Not panic.
I had to remember.
The police obtained warrants.
Julian's phone records.
Derek's.
Financial records.
Meridian communications.
Meanwhile, Julian's attorney called the investigation “a vindictive attempt by an estranged spouse to criminalize a traffic accident.”
That phrase appeared in a court filing.
I read it twice.
Vindictive.
I had two broken legs.
He had $1.8 million hidden.
Somehow I was vindictive.
Three days later, Derek Sloan was arrested.
Not for the crash.
For bribery and corporate fraud.
Federal investigators had entered the case after Meridian's payment records surfaced.
Derek requested an attorney.
Then refused to speak.
Julian was placed on administrative leave by his employer.
He blamed me.
Through his attorney, of course.
He also stopped paying several household bills.
The mortgage.
Utilities.
Chloe's school tuition.
Rebecca smiled when she saw the pattern.
“He's trying to pressure you.”
“It works.”
“No.”
She looked at me.
“It scares you. That's different.”
We requested temporary support.
The judge ordered Julian to maintain household expenses.
He objected.
The judge didn't care.
For the first time, institutions were forcing Julian to hear no.
He wasn't handling it well.
Then my sister Rachel arrived.
Not lawyer Rebecca.
My younger sister, Rachel Morgan.
She lived in Connecticut.
We hadn't been close for years.
Mostly because Julian disliked her.
“She interferes.”
He used to say.
Now I understood what interfere meant.
She noticed things.
Rachel walked into my hospital room, saw me, and burst into tears.
“Don't.”
I said.
“I'm allowed.”
“You'll make me cry.”
“Good.”
She hugged me carefully.
Then stepped back.
“I should've done more.”
“What?”
“I knew he was controlling.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
She stared.
“I did.”
Memory stabbed.
Three years earlier.
Thanksgiving.
Rachel and Julian arguing after he criticized me for spending too much on Chloe's birthday.
Rachel pulled me aside.
“This isn't normal.”
I defended him.
He's stressed.
You don't understand our marriage.
Stop judging.
Then I stopped calling as often.
Julian didn't force me.
Not directly.
He simply made every relationship that challenged him exhausting.
Eventually, I chose peace.
His version of peace.
“I’m sorry.”
I whispered.
Rachel shook her head.
“No.”
She sat beside me.
“We start from here.”
That sentence became another anchor.
Not from where I should have noticed.
Not from where I should have left.
Here.
We start from here.
My discharge date was still at least two weeks away.
After that, inpatient rehabilitation.
Then home modifications.
Wheelchair.
Physical therapy.
A long road.
Julian had wanted to drag me home because my recovery inconvenienced him.
Now he wasn't allowed near me.
And strangely, recovery became easier.
Pain still hurt.
Physical therapy still made me swear.
But fear wasn't waiting beside my bed.
Chloe visited daily.
We did homework together.
Rachel stayed nearby.
Mrs. Callahan brought lasagna.
My old college friend Melissa sent flowers.
People I thought I'd lost started returning.
Then Detective Bell called.
“We found messages.”
My heart stopped.
“Between Julian and Derek?”
“Yes.”
“What do they say?”
Bell hesitated.
“Nothing explicitly ordering an accident.”
Of course.
“But?”
“Three days before the collision, Julian sent Derek your vehicle description.”
I stopped breathing.
Why would he do that?
Then another message.
She usually leaves around 5:30 Thursdays.
Another:
Make sure she doesn't see you.
My entire body went cold.
“What was Derek supposed to do?”
“We're working on that.”
Then Bell said:
“There is one message from Derek after the crash.”
“What?”
Bell read it.
THAT WASN'T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN.
My heart hammered.
Then Julian's response:
DON'T TEXT ME AGAIN.
I closed my eyes.
Something had been planned.
Maybe surveillance.
Maybe intimidation.
Maybe theft.
Maybe the crash.
But something.
Then Bell said:
“There's more.”
I almost laughed.
There was always more.
“Derek received fifty thousand dollars from Bennett Consulting two days before the accident.”
I stared at the wall.
“For what?”
“No invoice.”
“Where did it go?”
“Twenty thousand remains. Thirty thousand was transferred elsewhere.”
“To who?”
“We don't know yet.”
But Samuel found out before police did.
The thirty thousand had gone to a private investigator.
A man named Wade Mercer.
May you like
Julian had hired someone to follow me.
For months.
