Chapter 6: What Grandma Hadn't Told Me
She sat down across from me and wrapped both hands around her cup.
The silence lasted long enough that I knew whatever was coming, she'd been deciding whether to say it for a while.
"There are things about your mother's last year that I haven't told you," she said.
"Not because I was hiding them.
Because I didn't think they were mine to give."
"Tell me now."
Grandma looked at her cup.
"Your mother borrowed money from Ronnie before she found out what he was.
Early in the marriage, when she was first getting sick and the bills were starting.
She didn't want to ask me — she knew I didn't trust him, and she didn't want to hear me say I told you so." A pause.
"He gave it to her.
No questions, no pressure.
She was grateful."
"Okay."
"What she didn't know was that he'd taken out a loan in her name to do it.
Used her signature — she'd signed a stack of documents when they married and he'd kept one blank page." Grandma's voice was steady but quiet.
"By the time she found out, she was too sick to fight it.
The debt was in her name.
When she passed, it came to the estate."
My chest tightened.
"Did it come to me?"
"I paid it off before you turned eighteen.
I didn't want you to know." She looked up.
"That's what Ronnie means when he says he knows things about your mother.
He's going to tell you she had debt.
He's going to make it sound like she was irresponsible.
Like he was actually helping her." Her jaw tightened slightly.
"He's done it before.
With the first widow.
Her children almost believed him."
I thought about his voice on the phone.
Calm.
Controlled.
*Things that might change how you're feeling right now.*
"He's trying to make me doubt her," I said.
"He's trying to make you doubt me," Grandma said.
"And through me, doubt everything in that envelope."
I looked at the folder on the table.
The timeline she'd built.
The business card.
Two years of quiet, careful work.
"It won't work," I said.
"I know." She almost smiled.
"But I wanted you to hear it from me first."
I reached across the table and put my hand over hers.
She turned her hand over and held mine.
We sat like that for a while.
In the morning, Detective Reyes arrived at nine.
She was younger than I expected — early forties, dark hair pulled back, a plain jacket.
She shook my hand and sat at the kitchen table with a notepad and a small recorder.
"I want to be clear about what this is," she said.
"This is a voluntary statement.
You're not obligated to provide it, and you can stop at any time.
What you tell me today may be used as part of an ongoing investigation.
Do you understand?"
"Yes."
"Do you want to proceed?"
"Yes."
She clicked the recorder on.
"Tell me about the night he took you to dinner."
I told her everything.
The dorm.
The pen.
The restaurant.
The questions about Grandma's health.
The loan request.
The texts.
The new number.
The phone call.
She wrote steadily and didn't interrupt.
When I finished, she looked up.
"The text messages — do you still have them?"
"Yes."
"I'd like copies.
We can do that now if you're willing."
I handed her my phone.
While she worked, I looked at Grandma across the table.
Grandma was watching Detective Reyes with the careful attention of someone who had been waiting a long time for this particular morning.
Detective Reyes handed my phone back.
"One more question," she said.
"He called you last night from a new number.
Did he say anything specific about meeting you?"
"He asked me to meet him for coffee today."
She nodded slowly.
"Would you be willing to meet him?"
May you like
I looked at her.
"With us listening," she said.
