Chapter 8
The formal report changed everything.
Investigators requested records through proper channels.
The old crash file was reviewed.
The insurer provided photographs of the wrecked sedan.
The salvage company confirmed the vehicle had been destroyed more than a year earlier.
That eliminated the easiest path to proving mechanical tampering.
Raffaele hated hearing it.
He could not change it.
Marcus’s attorney accused him of manufacturing a criminal theory after a domestic fight.
Celeste retained separate counsel.
Raffaele filed for divorce.
That became public in their social circle within days.
He also removed Celeste permanently from the estate and changed every authorization involving Lucy.
Preschool pickup.
Pediatric records.
Travel documents.
Household access.
Teresa became Lucy’s emergency guardian if anything happened to Raffaele.
The decision cost him.
Several people close to the family had liked Celeste.
Some believed Raffaele was reacting too aggressively.
Others quietly asked whether the marriage had always been unstable.
Raffaele stopped trying to control what they believed.
Then Marcus filed an assault complaint.
Raffaele’s attorney informed him that self-defense might explain the punch after Marcus swung, but the strike against Celeste would receive separate scrutiny.
“You can’t tell investigators you want accountability for everyone except yourself.”
“I won’t.”
Meanwhile, Corsini logistics operations began suffering.
Marcus had controlled too many vendor relationships personally.
Deliveries stalled.
Insurance renewals required new signatures.
Two managers admitted they did not know how certain contracts had been negotiated.
Raffaele realized the problem extended beyond criminal suspicion.
He had built an organization where one man could become operationally indispensable.
Marcus had used trust as infrastructure.
Then the lead investigator on Anna’s reopened case called Claire.
The crash reconstruction had produced one important inconsistency.
Anna’s sedan had not simply drifted off the road.
Damage patterns in the original photographs suggested a possible impact along the rear quarter panel before it left the roadway.
The first investigation had noted the damage but attributed it to the barrier.
The new review could not prove another car caused it.
But it could not exclude one either.
Then they compared the timing with toll and traffic-camera records preserved from the original case.
A vehicle connected to Daniel Price had entered the same parkway corridor nine minutes behind Anna.
It exited twenty-three minutes later than expected.
Investigators had questioned Daniel at the time.
He claimed he was home.
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Marcus had provided a work record supporting that claim.
The work record was false.
