"We'll need both of you for formal statements.
Colonel Lane, your role in this investigation is now part of the record.
Your commanding officer has been informed."
"Understood."
Marissa stood up.
"What happens to me?"
"You're a witness and a victim," Sandra said.
"You're not under investigation.
Your recordings are the strongest evidence we have."
Marissa nodded.
She picked up her purse and walked to the door.
Then she stopped.
"Sandra," she said.
"How long will Blake be in custody?"
"His attorney is already negotiating bail.
Given the flight risk — the offshore accounts — the judge may deny it.
But I can't promise anything."
"If he gets out," Marissa said, "he'll try to contact me."
"Then you call me." Sandra handed her a card.
"Day or night."
Marissa took the card and left.
I stayed seated.
Sandra looked at me.
"Colonel Lane, can I ask you something personal?"
"Go ahead."
"Why didn't you just report this through normal channels?
You had enough evidence months ago.
You could have handed it to the FBI and walked away."
"I thought about it."
"What changed?"
"My father called me.
He saw a photo of my car and decided I needed to be questioned.
In front of his donors.
At a public event."
Sandra leaned back in her chair.
"So you let him set the stage."
"He built the stage.
I just walked onto it."
She smiled.
"That's one way to handle a family reunion."
Three weeks later, my father stood behind the pulpit of his church.
The sanctuary was full.
Word had spread through the community faster than any sermon ever had.
I sat in the back row.
Marissa sat beside me.
She had a legal pad on her lap, though she wasn't writing anything.
My father looked older.
Thinner.
He had aged ten years in three weeks.
"I'm not going to pretend I have easy words today," he said into the microphone.
"I'm not going to tell you a story that makes you feel comfortable.
I'm going to tell you the truth, because that's what I should have done a long time ago."
The room was silent.
"For three years, a man I trusted — a man I invited into my family — stole from the foundation you built with your generosity.
He used my name.
He used my signature.
And I let it happen because I didn't ask the questions I should have asked."
A woman in the third row wiped her eyes.
"I failed you.
I failed my family.
And I failed the standard I've been preaching from this pulpit for forty years."
He paused.
His hand gripped the edge of the pulpit the same way it had gripped the podium at Oakwood Legacy Club.
"The foundation is now under court supervision.
Every dollar that can be recovered will be returned.
I have cooperated fully with the investigation, and I will continue to do so."
He looked toward the back of the church.
Toward me.
"My daughter Ava is here today.