Chapter 4 - MY MOTHER’S SIGNATURE
Melissa would not let me call my mother while I was angry.
“You can call her,” she said. “But first you need to know what you’re asking.”
“I’m asking why she stole from me.”
“You’re asking whether these distributions were legitimate, improper, coerced, fraudulent, or some mixture of all four.”
“They went to Raymond’s company.”
“Some did.”
“Hundreds of thousands.”
“Yes.”
“What legitimate reason could there be?”
Melissa closed the folder.
“That’s what an accounting is for.”
I hated her careful answers.
Later I understood why she gave them.
Adults who had failed me had always spoken with certainty.
Melissa was the first adult willing to admit what she did not yet know.
Detective Pike called that afternoon.
They had reviewed several recordings from my cloud account.
Not all eight months.
There were more than two hundred files.
But enough.
He asked Rebecca to put him on speaker.
One recording captured Raymond telling me, “Nobody cares about bruises if the girl getting them is crazy.”
Another captured my mother telling him to leave me alone.
Raymond responded, “Then tell her to stop asking about the statements.”
There was a pause.
My mother said, “She turns eighteen in two weeks.”
Raymond laughed.
“Then we’ve got two weeks.”
The recording ended.
I stared at the kitchen wall.
Rebecca whispered, “Jesus.”
Detective Pike continued.
“There are also recordings in which your mother tells you to lie about injuries.”
“I know.”
“We’re going to need you to identify dates and locations when you’re physically able.”
“Okay.”
“And Nora?”
“Yes?”
“The existence of recordings does not mean you need to confront anyone yourself.”
I looked at Melissa.
“I’m learning that.”
That evening, my mother requested permission through Children Services to see me.
I said no.
Then I changed my mind.
Not because I missed her.
Because I wanted to watch her answer a question without Raymond beside her.
We met the next afternoon in a small conference room at the agency office.
A caseworker sat near the door.
Rebecca waited down the hall.
My mother looked smaller than she had in the hospital.
No makeup.
No jewelry.
Her hair pulled into a loose ponytail.
She stared at the brace on my wrist.
“How bad is it?”
“You were there.”
“Nora.”
“Why did six hundred thousand dollars leave Dad’s trust?”
Her face emptied.
“So Rebecca showed you.”
“Melissa showed me.”
That frightened her more.
“You spoke to Melissa?”
“She was Dad’s attorney.”
“She handled the estate.”
“And you ignored her certified letters.”
My mother looked toward the caseworker.
“This is a family financial matter.”
The caseworker said, “Then answer your daughter.”
My mother rubbed her hands together.
“Some of those payments were for the house.”
“Raymond’s business.”
“He did repairs.”
“For ninety-one thousand dollars?”
“We had structural work.”
“We had a new deck.”
“Nora, you don’t know how expensive things are.”
I leaned forward.
“My father left almost two million dollars for me.”
“And who paid the property taxes on the house you lived in?”
“You?”
“Yes.”
“With my money?”
Her lips pressed together.
I felt something inside me become very still.
“Did you use my trust to pay your mortgage?”
“It was your home too.”
“Did you?”
She stared at the table.
“Yes.”
The caseworker stopped writing for a moment.
My mother’s eyes filled.
“After Michael died, everything collapsed. The life insurance outside the trust was smaller than I expected. The mortgage reset. I was working part-time because you were still in school and I—”
“I was fourteen.”
“I know.”
“You could have sold the house.”
“You had just lost your father.”
“So you stole from me instead.”
“I kept you in your home.”
I stood too fast.
Pain shot through my ribs.
The caseworker rose.
My mother did too.
“Nora, wait.”
I looked at her.
“Did Raymond know?”
She went silent.
That silence answered first.
Then she said, “Not at the beginning.”
“When did he find out?”
“About six months later.”
“What did he do?”
She looked toward the closed door.
Her voice dropped.
“He offered to fix the records.”
My skin went cold.
“What records?”
“The first distribution.”
“How much?”
“Thirty-eight thousand.”
I laughed again, but nothing about it was funny.
“You took thirty-eight thousand dollars.”
“I was going to replace it.”
“And then?”
“Raymond found the transfer.”
“What did he want?”
My mother’s eyes moved to the brace on my wrist.
For several seconds, she couldn’t look higher.
Finally she whispered, “At first? Nothing.”
I waited.
“What do you mean, at first?”
Her eyes lifted.
“I mean you’re wrong about one thing.”
“What?”
“You think Raymond started stealing from you and I helped him.”
May you like
She swallowed.
“I stole the first dollar before Raymond ever touched you.”
