My Mother Recognized My Fake Fiance From an Autumn Night Five Years Ago
Frank stopped wiping his glasses. He set them on the table and looked at me, his eyes very clear behind the lenses. “That is not where that car went, Mia.”
“Where did it go, Frank?”
“It went north,” Frank said. “Thirty miles north to a shop in Clarion. A boy named Bobby ran it. He was your mother’s cousin’s stepson.”
“Why would she send it all the way to Clarion?” I asked.
“By the time the tow truck arrived, Johnny Miller, the deputy’s brother, told me he saw the flatbed truck heading up Route 19 after midnight. Your mother wanted it done quiet.”
My hand tightened on my silver ring. “What did the damage look like?”
“Johnny said the entire front grille was pushed back into the engine block,” Frank said. “And there was blue paint scraped all along the passenger side door. Like she had sideswiped something stationary.”
“Something stationary,” I repeated.
“Like a parked van,” Frank said. “Johnny told me he never saw a car destroyed like that without someone going to the hospital. But your mother was home the next day.”
