Chapter 2 - The Camera Facing the Little Chair
Police found Hunter’s red backpack beneath the workbench.
His dinosaur pajamas were still folded inside.
His favorite blue blanket lay on the cot behind the partition.
His tablet was there too, powered off.
So was a ring light.
The setup looked less like punishment and more like an amateur interview room.
Morales sat beside me in the hospital family lounge.
“We found several memory cards, but the camera itself is missing.”
“My mother took it?”
“Possibly.”
“Why would she record him saying those things?”
Morales did not speculate.
“We need Hunter’s forensic interview before we decide motive.”
That was one thing I respected about her.
She did not turn suspicion into fact just because the facts were already awful.
Hunter was not questioned immediately. His surgeon insisted on rest. A child-advocacy specialist waited until he could remain awake without his pain climbing.
Meanwhile, officers interviewed Evelyn and Bertha separately.
Evelyn claimed the laminated cards were part of a “behavior game.”
Bertha said she had never seen them.
That lie lasted less than two hours.
One of her fingerprints was on the laminate.
Another was found on the tripod.
Then investigators recovered deleted photographs from Bertha’s cloud account.
In one, Hunter sat in the folding chair crying.
Evelyn stood behind the camera.
In another, Bertha held one of the cards beside the lens.
The timestamp was six weeks earlier.
Six weeks.
Hunter’s old bruises suddenly had a timeline.
“He had been visiting them before this trip,” I whispered.
Every other Saturday while I worked.
I had believed my mother was helping.
A police officer brought Morales a manila envelope while we were talking.
Inside were copies of three reports Evelyn had made to Arizona’s child-abuse hotline over the previous four months.
All anonymous.
All concerning me.
One alleged Hunter was frequently left alone while I worked.
Another claimed he feared returning home.
The third said a child in my household had unexplained bruising.
“But those bruises happened there,” I said.
Morales nodded.
“That is what we now need to determine.”
I felt sick.
My mother had been creating the injuries.
Then reporting them as mine.
May you like
This was not a grandmother who lost her temper.
It was a campaign.
