Chapter 7 - Thirty-Two Letters
There were thirty-two letters.
Eight birthday cards.
Six Christmas cards.
Photographs.
Copies of court petitions.
One tiny knitted bracelet Rebecca had mailed when Lily turned five.
Diane had kept all of them.
Lily sat in Paige Morgan’s office while Paige placed the recovered mail on a large table.
“You don’t have to read them today.”
Lily touched the envelopes.
“All of them have my name.”
“Yes.”
“Did Aunt Diane open them?”
“Most.”
Lily picked up a seventh-birthday card.
The seal had been broken.
Inside, Rebecca had written:
I learned from the school website that you won a reading award. I’m proud of you even if you never hear me say it.
Lily’s mouth trembled.
Diane had been in the audience that day.
She had brought flowers.
That evening she told Lily, “Your mother doesn’t even know what grade you’re in.”
Lily put the card down.
“Can I stop?”
“Absolutely.”
Paige closed the file.
Lily asked, “Did Aunt Diane love me?”
Paige took her time.
“I think people can love someone and still hurt them.”
“That sounds like what my mom said.”
“Your mother said something wise.”
Lily stared at the table.
“Then how do I know who is good?”
“You don’t decide people are good because they say they love you.”
“What do I use?”
“What they do. Whether they tell the truth. Whether they let you be safe. Whether they respect your boundaries.”
Lily thought about that.
At the next supervised visit, she brought one letter.
Rebecca saw it and began crying.
“You got them.”
“Police found them.”
Rebecca nodded.
Lily placed the seventh-birthday card on the table.
“You knew about my reading award.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“Your school posted honor-roll pictures.”
“You looked me up?”
“Every week.”
Lily’s expression changed.
“That’s creepy.”
Rebecca laughed through tears.
“Yes. A little.”
Lily almost smiled.
Then she became serious.
“Why didn’t you come to my house?”
Rebecca’s smile disappeared.
“Because the court order said I couldn’t.”
“You broke the order before.”
There it was.
Rebecca nodded.
“Yes.”
“So why not again?”
“Because breaking it made everything worse.”
“You could have taken me.”
“I did once.”
“And then?”
“You were scared.”
Lily looked down.
Rebecca continued.
“You cried for Diane.”
Lily looked up.
“I did?”
“You were a baby. Diane was the person you knew.”
The admission cost Rebecca something.
Lily saw it.
“I thought if I kept you longer, you’d remember me.”
Rebecca’s voice cracked.
“But you were eighteen months old. You didn’t owe me memory.”
Lily wiped her eyes.
“I don’t remember any of it.”
“I know.”
Rebecca did not ask her to.
The visit became easier after that.
Not happy.
Real.
Across town, forensic accountant Jonah Price analyzed Diane’s ledger.
Payments matched hospital events.
$25,000 to Voss’s wife’s consulting company three weeks after Rebecca’s toxicology alteration.
$40,000 after the repeat result disappeared.
$75,000 to Gerald Knox around the date Rebecca’s purported parental surrender was notarized.
$180,000 to Sloane’s former law firm during the guardianship litigation.
Then Jonah found recurring payments labeled:
E.B. CARE.
“Who is E.B.?” Paige asked.
Miriam answered.
“Evelyn Bennett.”
Rebecca’s mother.
The woman originally designated as Lily’s temporary guardian.
Evelyn had died when Lily was four.
Rebecca had always believed it was from complications of congestive heart failure.
There was nothing suspicious about her death.
But the payments dated from before she died.
Rebecca stared at the ledger.
“Diane was paying Mom?”
“Possibly.”
“For what?”
No one knew.
Miriam requested Evelyn’s old probate files.
Inside was a sworn affidavit Evelyn had filed eight years earlier but later withdrawn.
It stated that she believed Diane was pressuring her to support permanent guardianship.
In the original draft, Evelyn wrote:
Rebecca is ill but improving. Diane is using Rebecca’s illness to take control of Bennett Homecare. I do not believe Rebecca abandoned Lily.
The affidavit was never heard.
Three days after filing it, Evelyn withdrew it.
A later statement supported Diane.
Rebecca stared.
“Why did Mom change?”
Jonah looked again at the ledger.
One E.B. CARE payment was $150,000.
Issued two days before the withdrawal.
Rebecca whispered, “She bought Mom.”
Miriam shook her head.
“Or paid something for her.”
They needed proof.
Then Paige received a voicemail.
It was from Evelyn’s former home-care nurse, Teresa Franklin.
She had read about the case in the newspaper.
“I don’t know if this matters,” Teresa said, “but Mrs. Bennett used to tell me she was ashamed of something she signed.”
Rebecca listened twice.
Teresa continued.
“She said Diane had threatened to stop paying for her private nursing if she testified for Rebecca.”
Rebecca sat down.
Diane had not only manipulated courts.
She had turned medical care into leverage against their mother.
Teresa ended with one more sentence.
“Mrs. Bennett kept a recording because she was afraid no one would believe her later.”
Miriam looked at Rebecca.
“Do you know where?”
Rebecca did.
May you like
Her mother had maintained a safe-deposit box.
And Diane had been executor of the estate.
