The moment she saw my mother’s bruised face, her entire professional demeanor changed.
She immediately took photographs.
“Tomorrow morning,” Claire said, “we’re going to urgent care and getting a full medical report. After that, we’re filing an official police report. And you are not deleting a single thing from your phone. Text messages, emails, bank records, receipts, financial statements—keep everything.”
While we were talking, Brandon began bombarding me with messages.
The first one read:
“When you finally get over this silly dramatic anger, you’ll come back home.”
A few minutes later, another message appeared.
“I can apologize for snapping, but your mother is certainly no saint in this situation either.”
Then came the warning.
“Go ahead and make a massive scene out of this, but let’s see who ends up regretting it in the end.”
At exactly 8:17 the next morning, Claire called me while I was making coffee.
