Chapter 7 - THE LOCKED ROOM
We didn’t break in.
Victor owned the property.
I had no legal right to force entry.
That was frustrating.
Then Victor listed the lake house for sale.
Immediately after David spoke with us.
Someone had told him.
Who?
Samuel Price.
Rebecca had subpoenaed records through formal channels.
Price’s attorney notified Victor’s side.
Of course.
The lake house became relevant.
Victor wanted it gone.
David still possessed an old key.
Could he enter?
Rebecca said:
“Not if he no longer owns it.”
So we did not.
Instead, we sought preservation through legal process.
Victor objected.
That made the room more interesting.
Eventually, a neutral inventory was ordered because marital property questions overlapped with the divorce.
The locked upstairs room contained boxes.
Dozens.
Lorraine’s life in paper.
Old tax returns.
Custody pleadings.
Letters from David.
Checks.
And cassette tapes.
Mom recognized her own voice on one.
Court hearing recordings copied from official proceedings.
Lorraine had kept them.
One tape had been labeled:
HAYES LIED.
We played it through proper discovery review.
It was the 1997 hearing.
Mom had not lied.
But Lorraine interpreted every judicial limitation as betrayal.
Then another tape.
Recorded at home.
Lorraine speaking to six-year-old Victor.
“Your father chose that judge over you.”
A child’s voice:
“Why?”
“Because some women like breaking families.”
My stomach twisted.
Victor grew up hearing my mother described as the person who destroyed his family.
Then another recording.
Victor at twelve.
“I hate Judge Hayes.”
Lorraine:
“Good.”
My hands went cold.
This wasn’t proof Victor married me for revenge.
But it proved the resentment existed before he knew me.
Then we found a letter.
Victor, age twenty-eight, writing to Lorraine.
I met Margaret Hayes’s daughter tonight.
I expected her to be arrogant.
She isn’t.
Lorraine replied by email, printed and saved:
Be careful. Women like that learn manipulation from their mothers.
Victor had told Lorraine about me the night we met.
Not because Lorraine arranged it.
Because my surname triggered old history.
That relieved me.
A little.
Victor did not target me from the start.
He chose me despite Lorraine.
Maybe.
Then later messages changed.
Lorraine criticized me constantly.
Victor defended me at first.
Then less.
Then copied her language.
The pattern took years.
Not conspiracy.
Conditioning.
That was harder.
A secret revenge marriage would have been easier to reject.
A real marriage gradually poisoned by inherited control was messier.
Then one box contained something unrelated to Mom.
Fertility documents.
Not mine.
Lorraine’s.
Thirty-five years earlier.
She had undergone treatment to conceive Victor.
At the bottom:
Donor insemination.
David was not Victor’s biological father.
I stared at the record.
David stared too.
“I didn’t know.”
Lorraine had lied to him.
To Victor.
To everyone.
Then another page.
Donor number.
We traced what we legally could.
No identity available.
But medical history included:
Familial cardiomyopathy.
Potentially heritable.
Victor had never disclosed heart disease.
Maybe he didn’t know.
The embryo stored at Stellan was genetically his.
If the donor history was accurate, the embryo could carry risk.
Lorraine’s obsession with controlling future grandchildren suddenly had another layer.
She wasn’t only trying to replace me.
May you like
She had hidden Victor’s biological history.
And by creating an embryo in secret, she had potentially concealed relevant genetic information from the clinic as well.
