Mom did not know anyone had taken that blood.
Or at least she did not remember.
“Three months after Dad died?”
“Yes.”
She frowned.
“They took blood several times after I was jailed.”
“For medical reasons?”
“I assumed so.”
Vega placed the lab request on the table.
The signature authorizing collection had been forged.
The ordering physician was Calder.
The requesting agency was listed as the county prosecutor.
The prosecutor had no record of it.
“So Calder tested Mom’s blood.”
I said.
“And mine?”
Vega nodded.
“Apparently.”
“How did he get my sample?”
“We’re still investigating.”
I thought of the hospital wristband.
Age four.
He may have kept material for years.
“What did the test show?”
“That document wasn’t in Salazar’s storage.”
“Then why keep the request?”
“Maybe leverage. Maybe insurance.”
Everyone in the conspiracy seemed to keep insurance against everyone else.
Ray kept records.
Calder kept samples.
Salazar kept evidence.
Mercer kept notes.
Patricia kept memories.
Fear had preserved what loyalty could not.
Investigators searched Salazar’s storage for two full days.
On the second afternoon they found a false panel behind metal shelving.
Inside were three cassette tapes and a small digital recorder.
The recorder batteries had corroded.
The cassettes were older.
One label read:
R / T.C. — 11/17
The date of Dad’s murder.
The tape was digitized.
Vega insisted that only investigators hear it first.
Hours later, she called me.
Mom participated by video.
Escobedo sat beside her.
Vega looked more serious than I had ever seen her.
“We recovered a recording made on the night of the homicide.”
My heart began pounding.
“Who recorded it?”
“We believe Salazar.”
“Why?”
“Possibly to protect himself.”
Of course.
Insurance.
“What’s on it?”
She started the audio.
At first there was static.
Then Ray’s voice.
“He won’t stop.”
Another man answered.
Calder.
“You said he would.”
“I was wrong.”
A third voice.
Salazar.
“You both need to calm down.”
There was movement.
A door.
Then Ray again.
“He has copies.”
Calder said, “Take them.”
“I tried.”
“You said Teresa’s asleep.”
“She is.”
“What about the kids?”
“Valerie’s out.”
My chest tightened.
I had been at a friend’s house.
Matthew was two.
Sleeping upstairs.
Salazar spoke.
“Then handle Ernest.”
Ray replied, “That’s why Thomas is here.”
Calder cursed.
“I’m not killing anyone.”
The tape went quiet for several seconds.
Then Dad’s voice entered.
Distant.
Angry.
“I knew it.”
Everything inside me stopped.
Dad.
Alive.
Speaking.
Ray said, “Ernest—”
“No. Don’t.”
Dad’s voice moved closer.
“You brought him into my house?”
Calder said, “We can talk.”
“We’re done talking.”
Papers rustled.
Dad continued.
“I have the records. I have the transfers. I have what you did to Teresa.”
Calder replied, “You don’t understand medicine.”
“I understand fraud.”
Ray tried to interrupt.
Dad shouted over him.
“And you.”
Silence.
Dad’s anger changed.
Became quieter.
“You knew.”
Ray answered, “Ernest.”
“You knew what he did.”
“Yes.”
“You let me raise my daughter believing—”
“Valerie is your daughter.”
The sentence stunned me.
Ray said it.
Not Dad.
Ray.
Dad replied immediately.
“She is. That’s not the point.”
My eyes filled.
Even in rage, even while confronting the truth, Dad had said it without hesitation.
She is.
Not genetically.
Not conditionally.
Simply.
She is.
The recording continued.
Dad said, “You used us.”
Ray replied, “I helped you.”
“You paid Calder.”
“I paid for treatment.”
“You paid him to alter records.”
“To protect you.”
“From what?”
“The truth.”
Dad laughed.
No humor.
“You think this is protection?”
Calder intervened.
“Ernest, listen to me. No one benefits from this coming out.”
“The women you did this to might.”
Silence.
Plural.
Women.
My stomach turned.
I was not the only one.
Dad had discovered more victims.
Calder said, “You have no proof.”
Dad answered, “I have enough.”
Ray said, “And what happens to Teresa? Valerie? Matthew? The shop?”
“The shop can burn.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“I do.”
A crash.
Someone moved.
Dad said, “Get out of my house.”
Calder replied, “Give me the files.”
“No.”
Another sound.
Then the recording became chaotic.
A shout.
A metallic impact.
Dad groaning.
I shut my eyes.
Mom did too.
Vega moved to stop the tape.
“No,” I said.
She looked at me.
“Play it.”
The recording continued.
Calder was breathing hard.
“I didn’t mean—”
Ray said, “What did you do?”
“He came at me.”
Salazar’s voice.
“Is he breathing?”
Someone knelt.
Then Ray.
“Yes.”
Calder said, “Call an ambulance.”
Salazar answered, “And tell them what?”
“That he fell.”
“With all these papers everywhere?”
Ray said nothing.
Dad made a sound.
Alive.
Trying to move.
Calder repeated, “Call an ambulance.”
Then Ray spoke.
Very quietly.
“He’ll talk.”
Salazar replied, “Obviously.”
“If he talks, all of us are finished.”
Calder said, “I’m not doing this.”
“You already did.”
“No.”
Dad groaned again.
Something scraped.
Then another voice entered.
A woman.
Patricia.
“What happened?”
Ray said, “Why are you here?”
“You told me to come.”
“Not yet.”
“Oh my God.”
Dad moved again.
Patricia whispered, “He’s alive.”
Calder said, “Yes.”
Ray said nothing for several seconds.
Then Salazar spoke.
“If this turns into murder, I walk.”
Ray laughed once.
“You’re already standing in it.”
Salazar replied, “Don’t threaten me.”
“I’m stating a fact.”
A long pause.
Then Ray said, “We do what we discussed.”
Patricia whispered, “Ray.”
“What?”
“You said scare him.”
“That was before.”
My hands were shaking.
The plan had changed.
Not from innocence to murder.
From possibility to decision.
Ray continued.
“Teresa’s upstairs. The knife is hers. They fight. Everyone knows they fight.”
Calder said, “No.”
Ray ignored him.
“Blood on the robe.”
Salazar said, “Fingerprints?”
“She uses every knife in the kitchen.”
Patricia began crying.
“I’m leaving.”
Ray said, “You leave and I tell them who got the pills.”
She stopped.
Silence.
Then Dad whispered something.
So faint Vega increased the volume.
“Ray.”
His brother’s name.
Ray answered.
“I’m here.”
Dad spoke again.
“Don’t.”
That single word broke something in Mom.
She covered her face.
On the recording, Ray breathed heavily.
Then Salazar said, “If you’re going to do it, do it.”
Ray replied, “You said you walk.”
“I’m walking after.”
Another scrape.
Calder said, “Ray.”
Patricia said, “No.”
Then the sound came.
Small.
Wet.
A gasp.
Mom sobbed.
I could not move.
The tape continued.
Dad did not speak again.
Ray did.
“Now we’re all in.”
Vega stopped the recording.
No one said anything.
We did not need the rest.
But there was rest.
Evidence staging.
Instructions.
The fake emergency call.
Salazar telling Patricia how long to wait.
Ray discussing Mom’s robe.
Calder demanding the files.
And then something unexpected.
Before the recording ended, Calder said:
“You didn’t need to kill him.”
Ray answered:
“Yes, I did.”
“Why?”
“He was going to take everything.”
“The business?”
“Everything.”
Calder laughed bitterly.
“You mean Valerie.”
Silence.
Then Ray said:
“She was supposed to be mine.”
I felt nauseated.
Calder replied:
“She never was.”
“I know that now.”
“You knew years ago.”
“That doesn’t change anything.”
“She’s Ernest’s daughter in every way that matters.”
Ray’s voice hardened.
“Don’t tell me what matters.”
Calder answered, “This is why you wanted the tests repeated after Teresa was arrested.”
My head snapped up.
The jail blood sample.
Ray had ordered it.
Not for legal reasons.
For obsession.
The tape continued.
Ray said, “I wanted certainty.”
“You had certainty.”
“I wanted you to be wrong.”
“But I wasn’t.”
Another pause.
Then Salazar interrupted.
“We’re done. Clean the scene.”
The recording ended.
Mom lowered her hands.
Her face was wet.
“Ernest knew.”
I looked at her.
“What?”
“That you weren’t biologically his.”
“Yes.”
“He still—”
“I heard.”
Her voice broke.
“I needed you to hear it.”
I reached toward the screen.
We could not touch.
But she raised her hand to meet mine against the image.
Dad’s voice remained in my head.
She is.
Those two words did more than every blood test ever could.
Vega gave us several minutes.
Then she returned to the investigation.
“The tape gives us probable cause for multiple homicide-related charges.”
“Against Ray.”
“Yes.”
“Calder.”
“Potentially felony murder, conspiracy, obstruction and other charges depending on prosecutorial decisions.”
“Patricia?”
“Her cooperation will be considered.”
“And Salazar?”
Vega’s expression changed.
“He’s the problem.”
“Because he disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“Still nothing?”
“Actually, something.”
She opened a file.
Salazar had used a credit card the night before.
Gas station.
Two counties north.
Security video showed him alone.
Driving an old pickup registered to a cousin.
“Where is he going?”
“We don’t know.”
Then another investigator entered and handed Vega a note.
She read it.
“What?”
I asked.
Her eyes lifted.
“Salazar made a phone call from a prepaid phone thirty minutes ago.”
“To who?”
Vega looked toward Mom.
“To the prison.”
Mom straightened.
“What did he say?”
“He asked to speak with Teresa Mendoza.”
My skin went cold.
“Why?”
Vega folded the note.
“He said he knows where Thomas Calder is.”
“That’s it?”
“No.”
“What else?”
“He said Calder has the original clinic files, including records of every child involved.”
I stared at her.
“And?”
“He says Calder is planning to destroy them tonight.”
Click here to continue reading: PART 13: Salazar Offered the Location of the Missing Clinic Files, but He Wanted One Thing Before He Would Tell Police Where Calder Was Hiding
Forty Minutes Before My Mother’s Execution, My Little Brother Pointed at Our Uncle and Finally Told Us What He Remembered
Part 12 of 28
