Chapter 9: The Last Thing Victor Said
The state's attorney's office moved quickly.
Victor Laine was formally charged six days after his surrender — conspiracy to commit fraud, child endangerment, and unlawful administration of a controlled substance.
His cooperation agreement reduced the exposure but did not eliminate it.
His attorney released a statement.
Victor did not.
Renata Voss did not cooperate.
She hired the most expensive defense attorney in Chicago and said nothing publicly for two weeks.
Then her attorney released a statement calling the charges politically motivated and the evidence circumstantial.
The laboratory report was not circumstantial.
The estate documents with her handwriting in the margin notes were not circumstantial.
And Victor's testimony, delivered in a closed session to the state's attorney, was very specific and very detailed.
I was not present for any of it.
I knew what was happening because Damien's attorney kept him informed and Damien told me what I needed to know.
I spent those two weeks learning the boys' patterns.
Their sleep rhythms.
The sounds they made when they were overstimulated versus when they were simply tired.
The way the quieter twin — Marco — would go still before he became distressed, as if he were giving the world one last chance to calm down before he asked for help.
The louder one was Nico.
He announced everything.
Hunger, boredom, joy, discomfort — all of it came out immediately and at volume.
He was exhausting and completely transparent and I loved him for it within the first four days.
I was in the garden with both of them on a Thursday afternoon when Damien came outside.
"Renata took a plea," he said.
I looked up from the blanket where Marco was studying a leaf with the intensity of a scientist.
"When?"
"This morning.
Her attorney negotiated it yesterday." He sat down on the bench near the garden wall.
"Three years.
She'll serve eighteen months with good behavior."
"And Victor?"
"Four years.
He'll serve more of it." He looked at the boys.
"The secondary estate clause has been formally struck.
The documents have been refiled.
Everything is clean."
Marco held the leaf up toward the light.
"Is it enough?" I asked.
I wasn't sure what I meant by it exactly.
Whether I meant for the boys.
For Elena.
For the three years I had lost.
For all of it at once.
Damien was quiet for a moment.
"It's what the law allows," he said.
"It's not everything.
But it's specific.
It's documented.
It's on record." He looked at me.
"And your license reinstatement was approved this morning.
I wanted to tell you in person."
I looked at him.
"The board accepted the reversal petition," he said.
"The fraudulent findings have been formally struck from your record.
You are, as of today, a licensed practitioner in the state of Illinois."
Marco dropped the leaf.
He looked at his hands as if surprised they were empty.
Then he looked up at me.
I picked the leaf back up and gave it to him.
My hands were steady.
I was grateful for that.
"Thank you," I said.
"You did the work," Damien said.
"Three years ago and last week.
I just made sure the right people saw the documentation."
Nico, from the other end of the blanket, made a loud and emphatic sound that meant he felt the conversation had gone on long enough without including him.
Damien looked at him.
Something in his face went quiet and warm in a way that had nothing to do with power or strategy or the past two weeks of lawyers and statements and closed-door sessions.
He reached down and picked Nico up.
Nico grabbed his collar immediately and held on.
"There's one more thing," Damien said, over Nico's head.
"Victor asked to speak to you.
Before sentencing.
His attorney passed the request through mine."
I looked at him.
"You don't have to," he said.
"I told them it was entirely your decision."
I thought about the hospital corridor.
The prepared report.
The smile.
"I'll go," I said.
Victor looked smaller in the room where they brought him.
Not physically — he was the same man, same soft hands, same expensive watch that they had apparently allowed him to keep.
But something structural had gone out of him.
The scaffolding that the smile had been holding up.
He sat across from me at the table and looked at his hands for a moment before he looked at me.
"I wanted to say that I'm sorry," he said.
"For what I did to you.
Three years ago."
I waited.
"I told myself it was business," he said.
"That you were collateral.
That the trial needed to continue and you were in the way." He stopped.
"I've been telling myself that for three years."
"And now?" I said.
"Now I've watched what that same logic does when it's aimed at children," he said.
"And I don't have anywhere left to put it."
I looked at him for a long moment.
"I'm not going to tell you it's all right," I said.
"Because it isn't.
You took three years from me.
You took my work.
You took the thing I was best at and you buried it because it was inconvenient." I kept my voice even.
"But I have it back now.
And you're going to spend the next several years thinking about the choices that brought you to this room." I stood up.
"That's enough for me."
I left without looking back.
The car was waiting outside.
May you like
I got in, and for the first time in three years, I didn't think about what came next.
I just watched the city go by.
