The Road Outside Macon
Chapter 09 - The Road Outside Macon
Megan remembered the sound of the tire before she remembered the scream.
A sharp crack.
The car dropping hard to one side.
Luke cursing as he fought the wheel.
Ollie crying because the sudden jolt had torn him from sleep.
Then trees.
A ditch.
A shoulder of red Georgia dirt slick from rain.
The car did not flip. That was the miracle Megan would later count first.
The second miracle was that Ollie remained strapped in his car seat, terrified but unhurt, clutching the yellow blanket remnant and sobbing, “Mama, mama, mama,” as if repetition could keep the world from changing.
Luke’s forehead had hit the steering wheel. Blood ran from a cut above his brow, but his hands were already moving for his phone and weapon.
“Stay down,” he said.
Megan did.
Then a voice outside the car said, “That will not be necessary.”
Enzo Bellaro stood at the edge of the road with two men behind him.
He held an umbrella.
Of course he held an umbrella.
Megan unbuckled her seatbelt slowly.
Luke lifted his weapon.
Enzo sighed. “Don’t embarrass yourself.”
Luke fired no shots.
One of Enzo’s men opened the driver’s door and struck Luke hard enough to send him against the window. Not enough to kill him. Enough.
Megan’s hands shook as she reached back to Ollie.
Enzo stepped closer to her window.
“I truly hoped we could avoid frightening the boy.”
“You followed us.”
“I anticipated you.”
“That sounds like something cowards say when they hide behind children.”
His smile thinned. “Dominic has allowed you to become impolite.”
“I was poor before I met him. We learn faster.”
For the first time, Enzo looked annoyed.
That pleased her more than it should have.
Ollie cried harder when Enzo’s men opened the rear door.
Megan twisted in her seat.
“Don’t touch him.”
Enzo lifted one hand. His men stopped.
“I have no interest in harming the child, Mrs. Foster. I have interest in a flash drive.”
“It’s gone.”
“Yes. Dominic has a copy by now, I assume. The problem with copies is that people must decide which ones matter.”
Megan stared.
Enzo continued, “Ryan was brave. His father was brave too. Brave men are useful only when they understand timing. Neither did.”
Megan felt something inside her settle.
Fear remained, but beneath it came clarity.
“You killed them.”
“I corrected risks.”
“You killed my husband.”
“Your husband walked into a system much older than his grief.”
“My grief?”
“Yes. You have worn it like virtue for three years. But tell me honestly, Megan. If Ryan was so noble, why did he hide evidence in your child’s blanket instead of going to police?”
“Because men like you buy police.”
Enzo smiled. “Some of them. Not all. Never all. That is why careful men last.”
Luke groaned in the front seat.
Megan looked at him.
His phone lay under the brake pedal, screen cracked but lit.
A call was active.
Unknown if connected.
She turned back to Enzo.
“What do you want?”
“Dominic.”
“You already have half his life.”
“I have the necessary parts. But he has become sentimental.”
“Because he smiled?”
“Because he disobeyed fear.”
There it was.
The thing Carlo Mason had known.
Enzo did not fear Dominic’s violence. He had raised that. Shaped it. Fed it. Used it.
He feared Dominic’s mercy.
Enzo leaned closer. “Call him.”
Megan laughed.
The sound surprised them both.
“You think he’ll come because I call?”
“I think he will come because the child cries in the background.”
Megan’s stomach turned.
Ollie was still crying, hiccuping now, small and exhausted.
She looked at her son.
Then at Enzo.
And she understood something Dominic had not: Enzo still believed love made people easier to move.
He had never understood what women like Megan did with love.
They learned timing.
They learned which bill could wait, which fever could not, which landlord meant a threat and which one only enjoyed hearing himself speak.
They learned to survive while stronger people underestimated them.
Megan reached slowly for her phone.
Enzo watched.
She dialed Dominic.
He answered on the first ring.
“Megan.”
Her voice shook, but the words were clear.
“We’re on County Road 18, about twelve miles from the Macon address. Luke is hurt. Ollie is scared. Enzo wants you to come.”
Enzo’s expression sharpened.
Dominic said, “Are they touching you?”
“No.”
“Is Ollie hurt?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Megan inhaled.
Then she said the words she needed him to hear.
“Dominic, don’t become worse trying to punish him.”
Enzo frowned.
Dominic was silent.
Megan continued. “Your father said not to become him. I know he did. I don’t know how, but I know that’s what this is about. If you come here as Enzo’s monster, he wins even if you kill him.”
Enzo’s hand closed around the umbrella handle.
Dominic’s voice changed.
Not softer.
Clearer.
“Put him on.”
Megan held out the phone.
Enzo took it.
The two men said nothing for several seconds.
Then Enzo smiled.
“Dominic.”
Dominic’s answer came through the small speaker, low and controlled.
“You wanted me.”
“I made you.”
“No.”
The silence that followed felt like a door opening.
Dominic continued, “You trained what grief left behind. That is not creation.”
Enzo’s smile disappeared.
“I have the woman and child.”
“No. You have witnesses.”
At the far end of the road, sirens sounded.
Not Dominic’s men.
Police.
State police.
Federal vehicles.
Enzo turned sharply.
Megan looked at Luke.
His bloodied face had turned toward the cracked phone beneath the brake pedal.
A second active call.
Dr. Hale, maybe.
Or Silas.
Or someone Dominic had called before he ever answered Megan.
Enzo stepped back.
“You think courts can touch me?”
Dominic said, “No. Evidence can.”
Black SUVs appeared behind the state police.
Then one familiar vehicle.
Dominic’s.
Enzo looked at Megan with an expression so empty it chilled her more than rage.
“You should have accepted safety when it was offered.”
Megan reached back and covered Ollie’s ears.
“Funny,” she said. “I was thinking the same thing.”
And then Enzo lifted his hand toward the man behind him.
May you like
Not toward Megan.
Toward Luke.
