Chapter 6 - The Date Was Set
Mom’s appeals failed one after another.
Gregory Hale missed filing deadlines.
He submitted incomplete motions.
He refused to include Dad’s financial investigation, claiming the evidence had been obtained unlawfully.
When I confronted him, he closed his office door.
“You need to stop,” he said.
“My mother is going to die.”
“And you are putting yourself and Ethan in danger.”
“Is Victor paying you?”
His expression answered before his mouth did.
“I advise you to leave,” he said.
I placed my phone on his desk.
A red recording light glowed on the screen.
Hale stared at it.
“You should be careful,” I told him. “Numbers leave tracks. So do words.”
I gave the recording to a journalist named Maya Torres.
Maya had covered the trial but had privately questioned the speed of the investigation. She began publishing articles about Victor’s financial network and Hale’s possible conflict of interest.
Public pressure increased.
The governor’s office still refused to intervene.
Then the state announced Mom’s execution date.
December 18.
Sixty-one days away.
I drove to Ethan’s boarding school and waited outside until classes ended. When he saw me, he froze.
A staff member began walking toward us.
“Ethan,” I called. “I need you to tell the truth.”
He looked at the ground.
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“Because Adrian said he would make you disappear too.”
The staff member reached us and ordered me to leave.
As Ethan was taken inside, he shouted, “Check Dad’s old radio!”
Victor’s lawyers removed him from the school the next day.
For three weeks, no one would tell me where he was.
I searched every storage box from our family home until I found Dad’s old portable radio. It had belonged to his grandfather and no longer worked.
Inside the battery compartment was a tiny memory card.
The card contained audio files.
Dad had been recording conversations with Victor.
In the final recording, Victor demanded that Dad abandon the financial investigation.
“You will destroy the company,” Victor said.
“You already destroyed it,” Dad replied. “You stole from employees who trusted us.”
“You think Margaret will keep everything when you’re gone?”
“My family has nothing to do with this.”
“They will when the police see what you left behind.”
The recording ended with a door slamming.
It was the clearest proof yet that Victor had threatened Dad and planned to frame Mom.
Maya published the transcript.
The governor announced a review but refused to delay the execution without “new direct evidence related to the murder.”
Victor appeared on television and called the recording a manipulated attack.
That evening, Ethan appeared at my apartment.
He was alone, soaked from the rain and carrying a small recorder.
“I ran away,” he said.
I pulled him inside.
He placed the recorder in my hands.
May you like
“I finally got Adrian to talk.”
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