Chapter 9
I found the hidden trust papers a week after the trial.
They were tucked in the back cover of Mia’s baby book, right where Lila had said they’d be.
I’d avoided opening that book for months, too scared to see Mia’s tiny handprints, the first lock of her hair I’d taped inside.
But when I finally worked up the courage, the papers fell out into my lap.
I read them through tears.
My husband had been smarter than I’d ever given him credit for.
He’d known something might happen to him, working construction in the city.
So he’d written the trust with a catch.
If Mia died before she turned 18, the $2 million didn’t go to me.
It didn’t go to any family member.
It went to a foundation, to be set up in Mia’s name, to help kids with asthma get the care they needed.
Lila had never read that part.
She’d only seen the $2 million number, and she’d killed Mia thinking she’d get it all.
She’d murdered her own niece for nothing.
I set up the Mia Carter Foundation that month.
Ray helped me file the paperwork, find a board of directors, rent a small office downtown.
We started small.
We paid for asthma inhalers for kids whose parents couldn’t afford them.
We funded free asthma clinics at local schools.
We gave grants to hospitals researching better treatments for severe pediatric asthma.
Six months after the foundation launched, we’d helped over 200 kids.
Ray and I started dating a year after the trial.
He was gentle, kind, patient with my bad days, the nights I woke up screaming from nightmares about Mia.
He never pushed me to “get over it.”
He just held me, and let me cry, and told me Mia was proud of me.
I volunteered at the hospital where Mia died every Saturday.
I sat with sick kids, read them stories, brought them teddy bears just like Mia’s.
Maria the nurse worked there still.
We became close friends.
She told me the parents of the kids we helped called Mia their guardian angel.
I liked that.
Mia had always loved taking care of people.
Even at 7, she’d share her last cookie with a stranger, hold the door for old ladies, pet every stray cat she saw.
Now she was taking care of hundreds of kids.
May you like
Her legacy was love.
Not the pain Lila had tried to leave behind.
