Chapter 18 — THE HEARING

The licensing hearing was in Harrisburg in March, in a room with about ninety people in it, and it ran for two days.

I testified for four hours.

I had to read out my own sentence. *This restaurant is not a shelter.* Their counsel made me read it from the transcript of my police statement and then asked me whether I had said it, and I said yes, and he asked me whether I had said it to Nicholas Vasquez, and I said yes, and he asked whether I considered myself a reliable narrator of my husband's business.

That was the strategy. It was a good strategy.

It did not work, for one reason, and the reason was not me.

Nick testified.

He was fourteen by then. Ximena flew him in. He wore a shirt that Alma Delfín bought him and he sat in a chair that was slightly too big and he answered questions for fifty minutes.

Their counsel asked him whether it was possible he had been mistaken about what happened to him at Larkfield House.

And Nick Vasquez said:

"You can ask me again if you want. I've said it four times now. Once in March on the form, once to the shelter, once to Mrs Pinto, and once now. It's the same every time because it's what happened."

Then he said: "The form's the one that mattered. Nobody read it."

The Commonwealth revoked all four licences.

Gareth Moody surrendered his social work licence in May in lieu of proceedings and is under investigation.

Daniel's criminal matter is ongoing. He is charged with simple assault, endangering the welfare of children, and eleven counts related to the falsification of records. His attorney has been offered a plea twice and has not taken it.

I filed for divorce in January. It will be finalised this year.

Larkfield Care Group is in liquidation and I am the company secretary of it, which means I have spent about ninety hours of my life this year signing documents that wind up a business I never knew anything about.