Chapter 14 - The Truth Under Oath
The first criminal charges were announced several months later.
Not against everyone involved.
Not for every allegation we'd raised.
Investigators had found enough evidence to support specific charges relating to financial-document fraud and attempted unauthorized account activity.
Martin Vale and Peter Lang were charged in connection with the financial conduct under investigation.
Hollis faced charges arising from his own alleged participation in the document scheme, along with a separate state case involving what had happened to Wren at the lodge.
They remained allegations until resolved through the courts.
I understood that.
I also understood that the evidence was finally being examined somewhere Hollis couldn't simply silence the conversation by lowering his voice.
He hired an attorney.
His attorney issued a statement disputing the financial allegations.
Patricia stopped contacting me directly.
For a while, I thought she'd accepted that the wedding was over.
Then she sent a letter to Delma's house.
It was addressed to Wren.
I didn't give it to my daughter.
I gave it to Meredith.
The letter said Patricia was heartbroken about the family's separation.
It said Hollis had been under considerable pressure.
It said children sometimes misunderstood adult decisions.
And it ended with a sentence that made me put the page down before I could finish reading it aloud.
One day, Wren may understand how much damage she caused by refusing to cooperate.
I stared at the words.
Meredith waited.
Then I said, "She still blames her."
"Yes."
"After everything?"
"Apparently."
I folded my arms.
"I don't want Patricia contacting Wren."
"We'll address that through the appropriate boundaries and legal options."
I looked out the window.
There had been a time when I wanted Patricia to like me.
I'd listened politely to her criticism of my military career.
I'd laughed when she called my uniform masculine.
I'd tolerated the way she corrected Wren's table manners while ignoring Hollis's behavior.
I'd told myself families took time to adjust.
Now I realized how much energy I'd spent trying to earn approval from people who didn't treat my daughter with basic respect.
I wasn't doing that anymore.
The legal process took time.
There were hearings.
Evidence motions.
Financial experts.
Witness interviews.
Some charges were modified as the prosecutors reviewed what they could prove.
Some allegations never became charges at all.
The case wasn't the sweeping, dramatic event I'd imagined when I first learned about the blue folder.
It was slower.
More technical.
And at times painfully ordinary.
A lawyer would argue over the wording of a document.
A witness would struggle to remember a date.
An accountant would explain how a transaction request was routed.
Then everyone would go home.
I sometimes wanted to stand up and ask whether they understood that my daughter's childhood was part of what had been damaged.
But the court had to decide legal questions based on admissible evidence.
My task was to speak accurately.
Not dramatically.
Not vindictively.
Accurately.
By the time I was called to testify in the financial case, I had been working with a counselor for several months.
Wren had been seeing a child therapist too.
There were good weeks.
And bad ones.
She still disliked closed doors.
She still checked that she could open the bathroom door before using it in unfamiliar places.
For a while, she refused to attend birthday parties held in large buildings.
We never forced her.
We worked with her therapist.
We practiced.
We gave her choices.
And little by little, she began to trust ordinary rooms again.
I understood that healing wouldn't happen just because a judge signed an order.
Some things had to be rebuilt through a hundred small moments.
One safe bedtime.
One honest conversation.
One door that opened when she turned the handle.
On the morning I testified, Delma helped me straighten my uniform jacket.
"You could wear a suit," she said.
"I know."
"You don't have to look like you're going to an official ceremony."
I smiled faintly.
"This is what I feel comfortable in."
She stepped back.
"Then wear it."
I looked at myself in the mirror.
The same dress blues I'd worn on my wedding day.
I'd considered putting them away forever.
For weeks, I couldn't look at the jacket without remembering Wren's tearstained face.
But then I'd realized something.
The uniform didn't belong to Hollis.
That day didn't erase the years I'd spent earning the right to wear it.
So I had it cleaned.
Pressed.
And hung it where I could see it.
I wore it now because it was mine.
Not because I wanted to intimidate anyone.
Because I wanted to walk into that courtroom as myself.
Delma adjusted my collar.
"Ready?"
I looked at her.
"Yes."
Then she hugged me.
"Abel would be proud of you."
My throat tightened.
"I hope so."
"He would."
At the courthouse, Meredith walked beside me.
Raymond sat in the gallery.
So did June Halpern.
Evelyn Watkins was there too.
I hadn't asked them to come.
But when I turned and saw their faces, something inside me steadied.
Other people had lived through parts of this story.
I wasn't the only one trying to put things right.
When I took the witness stand, the questions began with ordinary facts.
My name.
My occupation.
My relationship to Abel.
The creation of Wren's trust.
How I met Hollis.
What access I gave him to my household records.
Then the prosecutor showed me the disputed documents.
"Lieutenant Colonel Merrick, did you knowingly authorize Mr. Garrity to submit this request?"
"No."
"Did you intend to give him authority to control the trust established for your daughter?"
"No."
"Did you direct correspondence about that trust to the Denver mailbox identified in this form?"
"No."
"Did you prepare the letter stating your grief had impaired your judgment?"
"No."
The prosecutor paused.
"How did you learn that Mr. Garrity possessed information about the trust?"
I looked toward the table where Hollis sat beside his attorney.
He was watching me.
For one brief moment, I remembered the man who'd stood in my kitchen making pancakes.
The man who'd proposed beside the lake.
The man who'd told me he wasn't trying to replace Abel.
Then I remembered Wren's voice coming through the locked door.
Mommy?
I looked back at the prosecutor.
"My daughter found a paper that had fallen from his folder on our wedding day."
"Where was she when she found it?"
"She was being taken to a service area of the lodge."
"Why?"
I swallowed.
"Because she wouldn't remove her late father's dog tags."
The courtroom was silent.
The prosecutor continued.
"What happened?"
"Mr. Garrity removed the tags and left my daughter in a laundry room that was locked from the outside."
"How old was she?"
"Nine."
I felt my throat tighten.
I forced myself to continue.
"When I found her, she believed telling me the truth would ruin my life."
"Why did she believe that?"
"Because Mr. Garrity told her I would cancel the wedding and spend the rest of my life alone if she told."
I heard somebody in the gallery shift.
I kept my eyes on the prosecutor.
"What did you do?"
"I carried her out to the ceremony."
"And?"
"I canceled the wedding."
"Why?"
I took a breath.
"Because my daughter's safety mattered more than the wedding."
The prosecutor nodded.
"No further questions on that subject."
During cross-examination, Hollis's attorney asked whether I had been under emotional stress.
"Yes," I said.
He asked whether I'd worked long hours.
"Yes."
He asked whether I still grieved my first husband.
"Yes."
Then he asked, "Would you agree that your grief sometimes influences your decisions?"
I looked at him.
"Like anyone who's lost a spouse, I carry that experience with me."
"Is that a yes?"
"It's an answer."
The judge reminded us to keep the questions and responses clear.
The attorney tried again.
"Would you agree that the events of the wedding day caused you considerable distress?"
"Yes."
"And that you reacted emotionally?"
I looked directly at him.
"I was upset. I also took steps to protect my daughter, sought police assistance, preserved evidence, and contacted my attorney."
He glanced at his notes.
"Are you saying you weren't angry?"
"No. I was angry."
He looked up.
"Very angry?"
"Yes."
He seemed pleased.
I continued.
"Anger doesn't make a locked door disappear."
There was silence.
I looked at the judge.
"Or change what the records show."
The attorney paused.
Then moved to another subject.
By the time I left the stand, my hands were shaking.
Meredith met me outside.
"You did well."
"I told the truth."
"That's what mattered."
I sat on a bench.
For a long time, I didn't speak.
Then I said, "I thought seeing Hollis would make me feel something."
Meredith sat beside me.
"Did it?"
"Yes."
"What?"
I thought about the question.
Not love.
Not longing.
Not even the fierce anger I'd felt in the weeks after the wedding.
I remembered his face when I told him to return Abel's tags.
The way he'd looked more concerned about the guests than the child he'd frightened.
I remembered how he'd said that Wren needed to behave.
And how I'd carried her while she apologized for ruining everything.
Finally, I answered.
"Relief."
Meredith looked at me.
"Relief?"
"That I didn't marry him."
She nodded.
Then I added, "And sadness for the woman who almost did."
That evening, I returned home.
My home.
Hollis's occupancy had been lawfully resolved months earlier.
The locks had been changed.
The pictures of Abel were back on the walls.
Wren had chosen new curtains for her bedroom.
Pale yellow, with tiny embroidered stars.
When I walked through the front door, I heard her laughing in the kitchen.
She was helping Raymond make spaghetti.
Or, more accurately, Raymond was trying to make spaghetti while Wren gave him instructions.
"Colonel Voss, that's too much salt!"
"Little lady, I've been making dinner longer than you've been alive."
"That's why I'm trying to help you."
I stood in the doorway.
Raymond looked up.
"Well, there's the commanding officer."
Wren turned.
"Mommy!"
She ran into my arms.
I held her tightly.
"How was your day?"
"Good. I got a hundred on my spelling test."
"That's wonderful."
"And Colonel Voss almost burned the garlic."
"I did not," Raymond protested.
Wren whispered, "He did."
I laughed.
It came easily.
So easily that I noticed.
We ate dinner at the kitchen table.
Afterward, Wren carried her spelling test upstairs.
Raymond stayed behind while I loaded the dishwasher.
"How'd it go?" he asked.
"Hard."
He nodded.
"But I told the truth."
"That's all anybody can ask."
I closed the dishwasher.
"Raymond, do you think Abel would be disappointed in me?"
He looked startled.
"Why would you ask that?"
"Because I let Hollis into our lives."
Raymond set down his glass.
"Sloane."
I looked at him.
"Abel knew you weren't perfect. He loved you anyway."
My throat tightened.
"He also knew you were the kind of person who would go through anything for that little girl."
I looked down.
Raymond continued.
"You made a mistake trusting somebody. When you learned what he was doing, you acted."
He paused.
"That's the part Abel would recognize."
I wiped my eyes.
Raymond gave a small smile.
"And if Abel were standing here now, he'd probably tell you to stop interrogating yourself and get some sleep."
I laughed through my tears.
"That sounds like him."
"It should. He said it to you often enough."
We stood quietly for a while.
Then my phone rang.
Meredith.
I answered.
"Hello?"
"Sloane, there's been a development."
I straightened.
"What happened?"
"Peter Lang has entered a plea agreement."
I gripped the phone.
"And?"
"He's admitted to specific financial offenses involving falsified documentation and unauthorized account activity."
I closed my eyes.
"Did he say anything about Hollis?"
"His agreement includes cooperation obligations. We won't know the full effect until the relevant proceedings conclude."
I took a breath.
"Okay."
"There's something else."
"What?"
"The investigators have completed the identification process for the recovered dog tag."
My heart stopped.
"Is it Abel's?"
"Yes."
I leaned against the counter.
"They confirmed it?"
"Yes."
For a moment, I couldn't speak.
Meredith's voice softened.
"Arrangements are being made for its release when the evidence process allows."
I closed my eyes.
The metal wasn't what kept us together.
Abel had taught Wren that.
But I knew how much it mattered to her to have back what Hollis had taken.
"Thank you," I whispered.
After I hung up, Raymond looked at me.
"What is it?"
I smiled through my tears.
"They found it."
He closed his eyes.
For a moment, he looked very old.
Then he nodded.
"Good."
I looked toward the stairs.
"She doesn't know yet."
Raymond smiled.
"Then when the time comes, you can tell her."
I nodded.
And I imagined Wren holding those two small pieces of steel again.
May you like
Not because they were the only connection she had to her father.
But because nobody had the right to steal that connection from her.
