She had protected her child while living inside a home where they read her phone, altered her medicine, and spoke about her death. In a letter to me, she wrote: Mom, if Tanya asks about me, tell her I didn’t leave because I wanted to.

Tell her that sometimes evil knocks on the front door dressed as love. Teach her that no one has the right to control her voice, her money, her body, or her choices.

The first hearing came four months later. Bradley arrived in a sharp suit, wearing the same arrogance he’d worn at the funeral. Heather came in without jewelry, staring at the floor.

Gregory wouldn’t meet our eyes. Tanya waited with Mrs. Haley in a nearby room.

When the prosecution played Katherine’s video, the courtroom went silent. My daughter named names, dates, amounts, account numbers. She explained how they’d forged her signature and how Bradley kept threatening to take Tanya.

Then they played the hallway footage. Heather shook when she heard her own voice saying that as long as Katherine lived, they’d never touch a cent.