Chapter 6 - The Video Sterling Thought Had Disappeared
The footage arrived the next afternoon.
Not to us.
To the police.
Detective Sloan made that very clear when Corbin called him three times in ninety minutes.
"If you call again," Adrian warned, "he's going to block you."
Corbin paced my living room.
"Wouldn't be the first emotionally unavailable man to do it."
"This is why people think you're exhausting."
"People love me."
"People recover from you."
I sat on the couch watching them argue and thought, absurdly, that I had missed this.
Not Corbin specifically.
The noise.
The kind of noise that did not conceal anything.
Sterling's apartment life had been quiet because hard conversations disappeared behind closed doors.
Corbin and Adrian could fight about a sandwich and be laughing ten minutes later.
Transparency was not always peaceful.
Sometimes it was simply honest.
At four, Sloan called Adrian and asked him to come to the station.
Corbin went too.
I stayed home.
Again.
That became part of my recovery: learning that not every truth belonged to me just because Sterling had dragged me near it.
The Tucson case belonged first to Adrian.
I had my own wreckage to clean.
I spent the afternoon deleting shared calendar events.
Weekend in Flagstaff.
Dinner with Sterling's parents.
Possible venue tour.
That last one made me stop.
Possible venue tour.
We had been casually looking at wedding venues before a proposal had even happened.
Sterling liked planning.
So did I.
I clicked delete.
For the first time in years, my calendar opened into blank space.
It scared me.
Then it relieved me.
At six, Tegan called.
I almost didn't answer.
I still did not know what she was to me.
She was the woman Sterling had cheated with.
She was also a witness to something terrible.
She had helped hide the truth.
Then she had finally brought it forward.
Human beings refused to remain inside convenient categories.
"Hi," I said.
"Can I talk to you?"
"You're doing that."
"In person."
I looked at the clock.
"Why?"
"Because I owe you an apology that isn't designed to make me feel better."
That answer surprised me.
We met at a crowded cafe near Tempe Town Lake.
Public.
Bright.
No salsa music.
Tegan arrived without makeup, wearing jeans and a gray sweatshirt. She ordered tea she barely touched.
For a while, neither of us spoke.
Then she said, "I'm not going to tell you Sterling manipulated me into everything."
I raised an eyebrow.
"Good start."
"He did manipulate me sometimes. He also scared me after Tucson. But three months ago, when he contacted me again, I was an adult. I knew he had a girlfriend. I knew you existed. I knew meeting him was wrong."
I waited.
"I told myself I wanted to find out what he knew about Corbin's investigation. That was partly true. I also wanted to know if Sterling still wanted me."
There it was.
Ugly.
Clean.
Honest.
"Why?"
She gave a small shrug.
"Because I hated that he had moved on and seemed normal while I still woke up thinking about Tucson. He built a life. I stayed stuck. When he called, part of me wanted proof that I still had power over him."
"So you used me to get it."
"Yes."
The word hurt less than it had two days earlier.
Maybe because this time nobody was decorating it.
"And the messages?"
"Real."
"The photos?"
"Real."
"The kisses?"
"Real."
I looked out the window.
People walked along the lake carrying drinks, pushing strollers, arguing about parking. The ordinary world had continued with insulting confidence.
"Did you love him?"
Tegan thought for a moment.
"I loved who I was before Tucson, and Sterling was connected to that version of me. I confused the two."
I looked at her.
That was more insight than I expected.
"Do you love him now?"
"No."
"Do you expect me to forgive you?"
"No."
"Then what do you want?"
She took a breath.
"To say I'm sorry without asking you to take care of my guilt."
I leaned back.
For the first time since meeting her, I felt something other than anger.
Not forgiveness.
Not friendship.
Respect, maybe.
A small amount.
"Okay," I said.
Her eyes filled.
"Okay?"
"I heard you. That's all I can give you right now."
She nodded quickly.
"That's enough."
Her phone buzzed on the table.
She glanced at it and went pale.
"What?"
"My attorney."
"What happened?"
She looked at me.
"Sterling was taken in for questioning."
My body went still.
"Arrested?"
"It doesn't say. Just that investigators asked him to surrender his passport and that his attorney is with him."
I felt no satisfaction.
That surprised me.
I had imagined the moment Sterling faced consequences and expected some surge of triumph.
Instead, I remembered him asleep on my couch with one sock on.
I remembered him teaching my nephew how to throw a baseball.
I remembered the engagement ring.
Then I remembered Adrian's hand.
Grief and accountability could exist together.
I was beginning to understand that too.
When I got home, Corbin was waiting outside my building.
He held two coffees.
"Bribery," he said.
"For what?"
"I have news you may hate."
I unlocked the door.
"That sentence has ruined my week."
Inside, he handed me one of the cups.
"The footage is clear enough to identify Sterling's car."
I sat down slowly.
"The crash?"
"Not the impact itself. The camera was pointed at the venue exit. It shows the Audi leaving at 12:31. Sterling is visible behind the wheel when he stops at the gate. Tegan is in the passenger seat."
"And Adrian?"
"A separate road camera recorded Adrian entering the frontage road less than three minutes later. Investigators are reconstructing the timeline."
I nodded.
"Dean Morrow?"
"He admitted Raymond paid him ten thousand dollars to erase the original exit footage."
"Ten thousand?"
"Apparently truth was expensive that year."
Corbin sat across from me.
"There were also old text messages recovered from one of the archived drives."
"Between Raymond and Sterling?"
He nodded.
"One from the next morning. Sterling wrote, 'Did he make it?' Raymond replied, 'Yes. Keep your head down. I'll handle the rest.'"
My chest tightened.
So Sterling had known Adrian survived.
He had known.
Every day after that, he had known.
"Was there anything about me?"
Corbin's eyes shifted.
I knew immediately.
"What?"
"Sloan shouldn't have told Adrian, but he did because it concerns you and they may want a statement."
"Corbin."
He took out his phone.
"There are emails Sterling sent himself. Notes. Maybe reminders."
"About me?"
"Yeah."
My stomach tightened.
"Read them."
"You sure?"
"No. Read them anyway."
He looked at the screen.
"One from three weeks before the Scottsdale event says, 'C. Martinez ex attending Phoenix Forward benefit. Might be useful to know whether they're still in contact.'"
I stared at the wall.
Corbin continued reluctantly.
"A week later: 'She works in operations. Stable. No obvious drama. Likely easier to approach alone.'"
Safe.
Again.
Always safe.
I felt tears burn behind my eyes.
"Keep going."
"Two months after you started dating: 'No indication she knows anything about Tucson. She barely speaks to C anymore.'"
I pressed my fingers against my mouth.
Corbin stopped.
"That's enough."
"No."
He looked at me.
"There are later notes too."
"Read them."
His voice changed.
"Eight months in: 'This started for the wrong reason. I know that. But I love her. Need to tell her eventually.'"
I closed my eyes.
Corbin went silent.
"More?"
"A year later: 'Almost told her tonight. Couldn't. If she knows why I approached her, I'll lose her.'"
A tear slipped down my cheek.
I hated it.
I wiped it away.
"More."
"Last year: 'I wish I could erase the beginning. Everything after was real.'"
I stood and walked toward the window.
Phoenix glowed beneath the evening sky.
Cars moved along the street.
People went to dinner.
Somewhere, Sterling was sitting beside an attorney while investigators asked him about a night four years ago.
And I was crying because the worst possibility was not that our relationship had been fake.
It was that much of it had been real.
"He loved me," I whispered.
Corbin did not try to contradict me.
"Probably."
I turned.
"Why does that hurt more?"
His eyes softened.
"Because then you can't throw away every good memory as a lie."
I laughed through tears.
"You already said that."
"I'm a musician. We repeat the chorus."
I sat back down.
"I wish I hated him."
"You might sometimes."
"I wish I hated him all the time."
"That sounds exhausting."
"It would be simpler."
"Yeah."
He leaned forward, forearms on his knees.
"But loving someone doesn't obligate you to stay when they're dangerous to your peace."
I looked at him.
"Did you rehearse that?"
"In the elevator."
I laughed.
Then, without thinking, I reached for his hand.
He took mine.
Nothing else happened.
No kiss.
No dramatic confession.
No revenge romance.
He simply sat with me while I cried over a man I would never take back.
And that was the first moment I realized Corbin had changed too.
Years ago, he would have tried to turn pain into movement.
A drive.
A drink.
A song.
A kiss.
Now he stayed still.
At 9:08 p.m., Adrian called.
Corbin answered.
"Yeah?"
Adrian said, "Sterling's attorney contacted the prosecutor."
Corbin squeezed my hand.
"About what?"
"A deal."
The room became quiet.
Adrian continued.
"He wants to cooperate against Raymond."
Corbin's jaw tightened.
"Of course he does."
"There's something else."
I almost laughed at the phrase.
There was always something else.
"What?" Corbin asked.
Adrian's voice softened.
"Sterling asked if he could speak to her before he decides whether to plead."
Corbin looked at me.
I stared at our joined hands.
Then I slowly let go.
May you like
"Tell him no," I said.
For once, the answer came easily.
