Chapter 8 - Marissa Finally Asked the Right Question
Marissa requested another formal interview.
This time without Gloria anywhere near the building.
“I want to correct something.”
Detective Keating turned on the recorder.
Marissa admitted Gloria had suggested the whole setup.
But there was more.
Two days before the incident, Marissa had tried to back out.
“I told her it was insane.”
“What did Gloria say?”
“She said Daniel already had another housekeeper coming Monday.”
That was false.
“She said your termination papers were final.”
False.
“She said the carriage apartment locks would be changed.”
False.
Then:
“She said if I didn’t protect Sophie’s housing, she would.”
Marissa had heard it as encouragement.
Now she understood it differently.
“Did she ever ask you to let Sophie live with her?”
“All the time.”
“Did you agree?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
Marissa cried.
“Because she doesn’t listen when Sophie says no.”
That was the first time anyone discussed Gloria’s behavior toward the child directly.
Not abuse.
Control.
Gloria decided clothes.
Meals.
Haircuts.
Daycare.
Bedtime.
She criticized Marissa for allowing Sophie choices.
“She says three-year-olds don’t know what they need.”
Sometimes true.
But Gloria extended it to everything.
Erin remembered one family dinner where Sophie refused to hug Gloria.
Gloria held her anyway.
Marissa intervened.
Gloria cried for two days and told relatives Marissa was “turning the child against her.”
A pattern.
Small individually.
Different collectively.
CPS expanded its assessment of Gloria as a potential caregiver.
Then police found something inside Gloria’s desk after a warrant connected to the forged witness document.
A folder labeled:
SOPHIE
Inside:
medical records.
Daycare reports.
Photographs.
A schedule of Marissa’s work hours.
Lists of times Sophie slept at Gloria’s apartment.
Receipts for clothing Gloria purchased.
And one page titled:
EVIDENCE OF PRIMARY CAREGIVER ROLE
Several entries exaggerated her involvement.
One was completely false:
Child resides with grandmother 4 nights weekly.
Sophie had stayed with Gloria maybe four nights a month.
Gloria had been building a custody file long before she built a case against me.
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The question was no longer whether she wanted Sophie.
The question was how far she had been planning to go.
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