As officers continued their investigation, another detail came to light. Three months earlier, Ethan and I had reported a spare key missing after realizing someone had moved the Mercedes.

Detectives had never closed that investigation. Security footage from a nearby parking garage showed my father driving the car with the missing key.

His attempt to publicly “gift” the Mercedes only strengthened the case against him. It confirmed what investigators had already begun to suspect.

When an officer recovered the missing spare key from my father’s jacket pocket, the confidence he had shown all evening completely disappeared-