Chương 12
The passenger-side scrape was worse than Ava had admitted.
It ran from the rear door into the quarter panel, white paint chewed down to gray primer in two places.
I stood under the garage light staring at it.
Ava hovered a few feet behind me.
“I’m sorry.”
I did not turn around.
“Did you know it was this bad?”
“Yes.”
“Then why did you call it a little scrape?”
She had no answer.
Deputy Harris crouched beside the damage.
“Was this reported anywhere?”
Ava shook her head.
“Did you hit another vehicle?”
“No.”
“A building?”
“A concrete column.”
“Any property damage to the column?”
“I don’t think so.”
He stood.
“Where exactly?”
She gave him the Fort Mill address.
He wrote it down.
I traced the air above the scratch without touching it.
My anger had become strangely practical.
Insurance.
Deductible.
Repair time.
Rental coverage.
Whether the dealership had a preferred body shop.
Things I could solve.
I wanted things I could solve.
Deputy Harris must have seen something in my face.
“This part is property damage,” he said quietly.
“The other part is separate.”
I nodded.
He was giving me permission to think about them separately.
I needed that.
Back inside, Grandpa had opened his laptop.
Mom was on hold with her bank.
Ava sat beside her with her own laptop pulled from the tote bag she had brought to dinner.
That laptop was not the one Deputy Harris had told her to preserve.
It was an older one she used sometimes when traveling.
She seemed ashamed of everything she touched now.
Mom finally reached someone at the bank’s fraud department.
Her voice changed immediately.
Calmer.
Formal.
The voice she used when calling insurance companies or dealing with billing mistakes.
“Yes, I believe there may have been unauthorized activity.”
She listened.
“No, I don’t know the full scope.”
Another pause.
“Yes, a family member may have provided information to a third party.”
Ava flinched.
Mom closed her eyes but kept talking.
Watching her describe the situation to a stranger did something none of our arguments had managed to do.
It made the facts sound real.
Not family real.
Not fix-it-at-home real.
Outside-world real.
After twenty minutes, the bank froze online access and told Mom she would need to visit a branch with identification.
Several recent transactions would be reviewed.
The representative could not tell her whether funds would be restored.
Mom wrote down a case number on the back of an envelope.
Her handwriting shook.
When she hung up, Ava whispered, “What did they say?”
Mom folded the envelope in half.
“They’re investigating.”
“Will they give the money back?”
“I don’t know.”
Ava looked down.
The old pattern almost returned.
I could see Mom preparing to reassure her.
Her mouth opened.
Then she stopped.
That tiny hesitation felt enormous.
Grandpa noticed too.
“Good,” he said.
Mom glared at him.
“Don’t.”
“I wasn’t praising the situation.”
“Then what?”
“You stopped yourself from promising something you don’t know.”
Mom’s expression hardened.
For half a second, I thought they were going to start another fight.
Then Mom looked at Ava.
“I don’t know what happens next.”
Ava nodded slowly.
“Okay.”
It was the first honest thing they had given each other all night.
Deputy Harris finished taking notes.
He gave us an incident number and explained that the financial portion might require additional reports depending on what the banks and lenders found.
He did not promise an arrest.
He did not promise restitution.
He did not tell us Mason was definitely a criminal mastermind.
He only said the information needed to be preserved.
Emails.
Text messages.
Account alerts.
Loan documents.
Voicemails.
Anything showing dates, access, or instructions.
Ava looked at him.
“What if I deleted messages?”
“Did you?”
“Some.”
“When?”
“Over the last few months.”
“Why?”
She looked embarrassed.
“Because my phone was full.”
Deputy Harris waited.
Ava sighed.
“And sometimes because Mason and I fought.”
“Did he ever ask you to delete conversations?”
Her face tightened.
“Once.”
Mom looked up.
“When?”
“After the loan.”
Deputy Harris’s pen stopped.
“What exactly did he say?”
Ava stared at the table.
“He said keeping application details in text was sloppy.”
“Did he tell you which messages to delete?”
“Yes.”
“Do you remember what they discussed?”
“Mom’s income.”
The kitchen went silent.
Deputy Harris wrote for several seconds.
“Anything else?”
“The Honda.”
Mom’s face changed.
Ava’s voice dropped.
“And Amelia’s SUV.”
I looked at her.
“What about it?”
Ava looked terrified to answer.
“He asked who technically owned it.”
Grandpa’s cane shifted against the floor.
“When?”
“Right after my birthday.”
I frowned.
“My birthday?”
“Your birthday.”
She swallowed.
“I sent him a picture.”
The post.
The keys.
The SUV.
The caption.
My chest tightened.
“What did he ask?”
“He said it looked expensive.”
“That’s all?”
“At first.”
Ava pressed both hands together.
“Then he asked if it was financed.”
Grandpa’s eyes narrowed.
“What did you tell him?”
“That you paid cash.”
He looked away.
Ava continued.
“He asked whose name was on the title.”
I felt something cold move through me.
“And you told him mine.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t think it mattered.”
Deputy Harris asked, “Did he ever ask where the purchase paperwork was kept?”
Ava closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
Mom whispered, “Ava.”
“I didn’t know.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That the temporary documents were probably in the glove box.”
I looked toward the side door.
The SUV sat outside in darkness now.
For two weeks, Ava had not merely been driving my car.
She had been carrying around every clue Mason needed to start asking better questions.
Grandpa’s face had gone hard.
“Did he ever drive it?”
Ava hesitated.
“Yes.”
My stomach dropped.
“When?”
“Twice.”
“You let him drive my car?”
“I was with him.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
She looked down.
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Fort Mill.”
“Why?”
“He wanted to see how it handled.”
I laughed once.
I could not help it.
Ava’s face twisted.
May you like
“I know how that sounds.”
“Do you?”
