I didn’t answer.
His eyes dropped to the forms on my bed, then moved toward Ortiz.
“She set me up.”
Ortiz’s expression didn’t change.
“Your daughter didn’t sabotage a gas line.”
His face went pale.
That was the first time anyone in the room had mentioned the gas line to him.
He stared at her.
And in that silence, he made his final mistake.
He said, “You can’t prove I touched it.”
Ortiz held his gaze.
“I didn’t say anyone touched it.”
He stopped breathing for what seemed like an entire second.
Then the excuses came.
He said the investigators were twisting his words.
He said shock had confused his timeline.
He said my mother had been unstable about money.
He said I was medicated and shouldn’t be trusted.
Within minutes, the man who had spent the morning calling me his miracle was explaining why nobody should believe me.
That transformation hurt more than I expected.
Some part of me had still been waiting for an impossible explanation.
A second car.
A misunderstanding.
A reason clean enough to give me my father back.
There wasn’t one.
The investigation moved quickly after that.
Forensic examination confirmed the gas line had been deliberately compromised before the blaze.
The ignition point had been arranged to delay the worst of the fire long enough for someone who knew the timing to leave.
Camera footage placed my father’s car moving away from our street before the first explosion.
His original statement placed him inside.
His conversation with me placed him outside.
The financial records supplied motive.
The increased insurance coverage mattered.
So did the transfers from my parents’ shared funds.
So did the debt hidden behind them.
Most painful of all was my mother’s bank voicemail.
When I was finally strong enough, Ortiz let me hear it.
My mother’s voice sounded irritated, controlled, alive.
She explained that money had been moved without her permission.
She wanted the bank to stop further transfers.
She said she had confronted her husband and intended to demand a complete accounting.
There was no fear in her voice.
That destroyed me.
She didn’t know she was describing the final argument of her life.
Prosecutors eventually built the case without needing a dramatic confession.
They had the fire evidence, the vehicle footage, the financial trail, the conflicting statements, and his knowledge of details investigators had never released publicly.
He was charged in connection with my mother’s death, the attempt on my life, the arson, and the financial scheme surrounding the property and accounts.
He fought the charges at first.
He blamed investigators.
He blamed my mother.
He blamed me.
His attorneys argued that grief explained his inconsistent statements and that financial problems did not prove murder.
On that second point, they were right.
Money alone didn’t prove it.
The gas line did not exist alone.
