Chapter 8: Richard Holt
Marcus made three calls in the next hour.
The first was to Detective Reyes, who picked up on the second ring and listened without interrupting while he explained what Petra had seen and who Richard Holt was.
The second was to his own attorney — a woman named Grace Chen, who I had met once at a firm dinner and remembered as someone who listened more than she spoke and billed accordingly.
The third call was one I didn't expect.
He called his mother.
I heard him in the hallway, voice low, words I couldn't fully make out.
The call lasted four minutes.
When he came back in, his face had settled into something resolved.
"My mother knew about Isabella," he said.
"About the relationship.
She never told me she was still in contact with her."
"Is she?"
"She says she isn't.
She says Isabella reached out twice in the last year and she didn't respond." He sat down.
"I believe her.
But I needed to ask."
"What did she say when you told her what happened?"
"She cried." He looked at his hands.
"And then she asked if she could come."
"What did you tell her?"
"I told her yes." He looked up.
"Is that alright?"
"Of course it's alright."
He nodded.
Looked at the window.
"Richard Holt," I said.
"What can he actually do?
With patient records?"
"He can access them.
Modify them, theoretically, if he wanted to and thought he could cover it.
Or he could pull information that Isabella could use."
"Use how?"
"I don't know yet." He paused.
"But if she knew which medications you were on, which appointments you had, which doctor was treating you — all of that would have made it easier to plan."
The thought settled over me like cold water.
She had known my schedule.
My medications.
My doctor's name.
She had known when I would be alone.
Because someone had told her.
Grace Chen arrived at ten.
She was exactly as I remembered — precise, unhurried, carrying a slim briefcase and wearing reading glasses pushed up on her head.
She shook my hand, asked how I was feeling with what seemed like genuine interest, and then sat down and opened her briefcase.
"Here's where we are," she said.
"The criminal side is Detective Reyes's territory and it's moving.
The civil side is ours.
I want to file today."
"Against Isabella," Marcus said.
"Against Isabella, and potentially against Richard Holt pending what the investigation finds." She looked at me.
"Khloe, I want to be honest with you.
Isabella's attorney is very good.
He's going to try to argue that the footage is ambiguous, that the substance was administered without criminal intent, and that the phone call last night was a personal expression of distress rather than a threat."
"It wasn't distress," I said.
"I know that.
You know that.
Our job is to make sure a judge and jury know that." She pulled out a document.
"The nurse — Petra — her statement is significant.
If Holt's involvement can be established, it demonstrates premeditation and a coordinated effort.
That changes everything."
"How do we establish it?"
"We subpoena his access logs," Grace said.
"Every time a patient record is accessed in this system, it's logged with a timestamp and a user ID.
If Holt accessed your records outside of any legitimate administrative function, we'll see it."
"Can Isabella's attorney block that?"
"They can try to slow it down.
They won't stop it." Grace looked at Marcus.
"I also want to talk about the relationship history.
I know that's uncomfortable.
But if we're establishing motive, we need the timeline documented."
Marcus nodded once.
"Whatever you need."
Grace made a note.
"There's one more thing," I said.
Both of them looked at me.
"Isabella said something before she left yesterday.
She said, 'You were never supposed to have him.' And then last night she said the attorney was the least of my problems." I looked at Grace.
"She has something else.
I don't know what it is.
But she believes it's enough to change the situation."
Grace was quiet for a moment.
"Then we need to find it before she uses it," she said.
She closed her briefcase.
"I'll file this afternoon," she said.
"And Marcus — I need you to think carefully.
Is there anything in your history with Isabella that she could use against you?
Anything at all.
Any message, any agreement, anything that could be taken out of context."
Marcus thought for a long moment.
Then his face changed.
"There's a letter," he said slowly.
Grace looked at him.
"What letter?"
He closed his eyes briefly.
"When I ended things with her," he said, "I wrote her a letter.
I was trying to be kind.
I said — I said things that I meant at the time but that could be read differently now."
"What kind of things?"
"That she deserved someone who could love her completely.
That I wasn't able to give her what she needed.
That if circumstances had been different—" He stopped.
"If circumstances had been different, what?" Grace said.
He looked at me.
"I said if circumstances had been different, I might never have left."
The room was very quiet.
Grace wrote something down.
"She's kept that letter," I said.
It wasn't a question.
"Yes," Marcus said.
"I think she has."
"And she's going to use it to argue that you still had feelings for her.
That I was the intruder.
That she was acting out of—" I stopped.
"Out of what?
Love?
Desperation?"
"Diminished judgment," Grace said quietly.
"Her attorney will argue diminished judgment.
That she was emotionally destabilized by the letter, by the relationship ending, by the pregnancy announcement." She paused.
"It won't excuse what she did.
But it will be used to complicate it."
I looked at the camera in the corner of the ceiling.
Still blinking.
Still recording.
"Then we need something she can't complicate," I said.
May you like
Grace looked at me.
"What do you have in mind?"
