Chapter 13 - Grant Knew
Claire felt the air leave her lungs.
“Grant knew?”
“He knew enough to ask questions,” Thomas said.
Six months earlier, Grant had called from a blocked number.
At first, Thomas thought his son finally wanted reconciliation.
Instead, Grant asked for old court files.
“What exactly did Diane submit?”
“Which doctors supported her?”
“How much did judges rely on family testimony?”
Thomas had answered because he believed Grant was trying to understand the past.
Now he understood differently.
“He was studying it,” Claire said.
Thomas did not disagree.
Detective Ortiz asked whether Thomas still had records of the call.
“Yes. I saved everything involving Grant.”
He sounded ashamed of that, as if a father preserving scraps of contact required explanation.
Within an hour, Ortiz received screenshots, call logs, and an email Grant had sent after the conversation.
One line stood out:
So the outcome mostly depended on documentation and credibility, not one dramatic event. Correct?
Claire read it twice.
Then a third time.
Rachel swore under her breath.
Grant had not lost control in the bathroom.
He had been building toward control.
The videos.
The private investigator.
Keller’s chart.
The surprise appointment.
The plane ticket.
The baby-monitor recording had captured the final stage of a plan that began months earlier.
Ortiz’s phone rang.
She listened, asked two questions, then stood.
“What happened?” Claire asked.
“They found Paul Mercer.”
The private investigator had been located at a motel near the airport.
He initially refused to cooperate.
Then police showed him the messages Grant had sent Claire from outside Rachel’s house.
Mercer changed his mind.
He admitted Diane hired him to document Claire’s “erratic behavior.”
But he also admitted something else.
He had never sent the two photographs Claire received that morning.
Those images came from a different camera.
Meaning someone else had been watching Rachel’s house.
“Grant?” Rachel asked.
Ortiz shook her head.
“We checked his release conditions and location data. He was at his attorney’s office during the first photo.”
Claire’s skin prickled.
“Diane?”
“No. She was home with an officer serving paperwork.”
Rachel looked toward the dark front window.
“Then who took them?”
May you like
Ortiz answered with a name none of them expected.
“Dr. Keller’s son.”
