Chapter 14 - Loretta Finally Learned the Whole PlanDetective Ruiz showed Loretta the draft removal resolution.
For nearly a minute, she said nothing.
Then:
“He was going to remove me?”
Her attorney closed his eyes.
Ruiz answered:
“That appears to be the plan.”
Loretta read the page again.
Cause for removal:
Financial misconduct.
Improper self-dealing.
Child-welfare concerns.
Failure to meet fiduciary standards.
Every crime Grant helped her commit.
Preserved.
Cataloged.
Ready.
Loretta laughed once.
Not because anything was funny.
“He was going to use Rory.”
Ruiz watched her.
“What do you mean?”
“The child-welfare concerns.”
“Yes.”
Loretta looked down.
“He told me those records protected me.”
“They protected him.”
Loretta covered her face.
For the first time, she saw the structure from outside.
Grant needed her to move the estate.
Then he needed her gone.
Once the foundation received Everett’s assets, the board could remove Loretta.
Grant and Parker would control the remaining votes.
The children would have no guaranteed distributions.
Vincent would have no formal authority.
Loretta would face the public fraud.
Grant would bill the foundation for “recovery services” while continuing to manage assets.
He would clean up his own theft by blaming hers.
Loretta whispered:
“I destroyed my family for somebody who planned to destroy me.”
Ruiz corrected her.
“You made choices for yourself.”
Loretta looked up.
Good.
No easy escape into victimhood.
Grant used her.
She still acted.
Loretta’s cooperation became fuller after that.
She gave passwords.
Account names.
Explained transfers.
Identified Grant’s coded references.
She admitted turning off cameras.
Admitted fabricating guardianship evidence.
Admitted deceiving Griffin into providing his handwriting.
Admitted forcing Rory to eat.
Then Ruiz asked:
“Did you strike him before the recorded incident?”
Loretta closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
“How many times?”
“I don’t know.”
“Approximately.”
“Three.”
Vincent learned that from prosecutors later.
Three.
He went into the bathroom and vomited.
Not because three was a huge number.
Because once already felt unbearable.
Three meant repetition.
Opportunity to stop.
Then another opportunity.
Then another.
Loretta admitted she became angry when Rory resisted food because Elena had been particular about feeding him gently.
“Why did that matter?” Ruiz asked.
Loretta cried.
“Because everything with those kids came with instructions from a dead woman.”
No.
Vincent understood the feeling but rejected the conclusion.
Elena had left routines.
Notes.
Preferences.
Loretta interpreted them as control from beyond death.
Griffin saying:
“Mom did it differently.”
Rory preferring Elena’s feeding methods.
Photographs.
Recipes.
Stories.
Loretta felt she could never replace Elena.
No one had asked her to.
But she competed anyway.
“Did you hate Elena?” Ruiz asked.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“She saw through me.”
Simple.
Elena discovered the money.
She challenged Loretta.
She expected Vincent to eventually choose facts.
Loretta resented her before death.
After death, Elena became impossible to defeat.
Dead people do not make new mistakes.
Memory polished them.
Loretta’s resentment shifted toward the children.
Griffin remembered Elena clearly.
Rory resembled her.
Every day, Loretta faced evidence Elena still mattered.
Again, explanation.
Not excuse.
Loretta gave investigators the location of another account.
$680,000.
She had hidden it from Grant.
“Why?”
“In case I had to run.”
“Were you planning to?”
“Eventually.”
“With the children?”
“No.”
That question mattered.
The guardianship plan was about control and legal leverage, not kidnapping.
Loretta intended to become their guardian temporarily if Vincent challenged the estate.
Then once the financial situation stabilized, she imagined returning them to him.
A fantasy.
She had convinced herself the harm could be temporary.
Griffin’s fear temporary.
Rory’s feeding trauma temporary.
Vincent’s separation temporary.
Financial control temporary.
Crime relied heavily on the word temporary.
Then Ruiz asked:
“Did you mean what you said in the kitchen?”
Loretta frowned.
“What?”
“That once the new will was signed, the boys would have nothing.”
Loretta’s face tightened.
“I was angry.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
Loretta looked down.
“I thought I’d control the foundation.”
“And?”
“I wasn’t going to give Griffin access when he turned eighteen.”
“Why?”
“He’d become like Vincent.”
“What does that mean?”
“He’d ask questions.”
Ruiz waited.
Loretta laughed bitterly.
“There. Is that what you wanted?”
It was not about protecting the boys from wealth.
It was about keeping them from becoming adults who could investigate.
Griffin was eleven.
Seven years from adulthood.
Grant probably expected to be long gone by then.
Loretta was already thinking about him as a future threat.
A child.
Because he asked questions.
Because he turned a camera back on.
Vincent thought of Griffin pointing upward.
Dad will see.
Loretta believed technology protected power.
Griffin believed his father did.
Vincent wanted to deserve that belief now.
Then prosecutors told him Loretta wanted to speak to him.
He refused.
She sent a letter through attorneys.
He left it sealed.
Griffin saw it on the desk.
“From her?”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to read it?”
“I don’t know.”
Griffin thought.
“Does she say sorry?”
“Probably.”
“Would that fix it?”
“No.”
“Then why read it?”
Vincent smiled sadly.
“Sometimes apologies aren’t for fixing things.”
“What are they for?”
“Maybe understanding.”
Griffin considered.
“Do you need to understand her?”
Vincent looked at his son.
“I need to understand enough not to lie to myself.”
That night, he opened the letter.
Loretta’s first line:
I know you think Grant turned me into this. Please don’t.
Vincent stopped.
Then continued.
May you like
He used things that were already inside me.
For once, his sister did not hide.
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