Chapter 12 - What Amber Was Actually Afraid Of
The confrontation happened in a county interview room with attorneys present.
Amber agreed to speak because prosecutors were considering charges related to Caleb’s poisoning, financial exploitation, and falsified care records.
Sarah attended only because Amber requested her.
“You always hated me,” Amber began.
Sarah almost laughed.
“This isn’t about whether we liked each other.”
“It is. You came into this family and decided everyone was dysfunctional except you.”
“I trusted you with my son.”
Amber looked down.
For the first time since the park, the arrogance disappeared.
“I wanted him to sleep.”
Sarah’s stomach tightened.
“You drugged a nine-year-old because he told the truth.”
“He kept saying I was poisoning Dad.”
“You were.”
“I was giving Dad medication he had been prescribed.”
“Medication his doctor discontinued.”
Amber’s attorney touched her arm.
Amber ignored him.
“You think I did all this because I wanted Dad’s money?”
“Didn’t you?”
“I wanted the property sold.”
“Why?”
“Because Mark had debts.”
There it was.
After the divorce, Mark owed nearly two hundred thousand dollars from a failed contracting business. Amber had co-signed one of the loans years earlier.
If Mark defaulted, creditors could pursue assets still tied to Amber.
The divorce had been real.
Their financial entanglement had not ended.
Mark proposed reviving Walter’s property deal. The development commission could clear his debts and release Amber from guarantees.
Walter refused.
Then Amber began exaggerating his memory problems.
When exaggeration did not work, she used Walter’s old medication before meetings to make the decline look worse.
“You risked your father to save your ex-husband?”
Amber stared at the table.
“To save Lily’s father.”
Sarah understood the motive without accepting it.
Mark’s collapse would have damaged Lily’s stability, exposed Amber’s old guarantees, and possibly cost Amber her house.
She had convinced herself that taking control of Walter’s property was protecting her daughter.
Then Caleb saw too much.
“What were you protecting in the park?” Sarah asked.
May you like
Amber whispered, “Everything I’d already done.”
There was no speech large enough to excuse that answer.
