Part 8
Marcus Shaw was arrested eight days later in Norfolk, extradited on charges tied to the mechanic who'd sabotaged my parents' brakes fifteen years earlier — a man Julian had spent five years quietly locating and who, faced with a reduced sentence, finally talked.
Derek was charged separately: attempted murder, insurance fraud, and conspiracy, once the sedative in the milk was confirmed by an independent lab and the security footage Julian had recorded went to the prosecutor. He took a plea rather than risk trial. Fifteen years, eligible for parole in ten.
Serena kept the baby and, to my genuine surprise, testified against him — she hadn't known about my parents, she said, only about the affair and the money, and I believed her enough to let the anger go, mostly for the child's sake.
Julian walked into the courtroom on his own two legs the day of sentencing, no chair, no cane, and the look on Derek's face when he saw it told me everything about how much that single image cost him.
Hale Shipyard is mine and Julian's now, fully, the way our father intended before either of us understood what that would require of us.
Some nights I still dream of the water rising past my chest.
But most nights now, I dream of the moment Julian stood up.
— THE END —
“My husband drove the car into the river with my brother and me trapped inside.”
