I gave my full statement from a hospital bed I hadn't yet been discharged from, my face still healing beneath careful reconstructive treatment that doctors told me, cautiously, would likely leave permanent scarring along my left cheek and jaw regardless of how skilled the surgical team turned out to be.
Priscilla, once confronted with the full scope of what she'd apparently participated in — not simply an affair, but active knowledge of a violent attack orchestrated to clear the path for her own wedding — cooperated extensively with prosecutors, providing text messages and voicemails that corroborated the timeline Detective Anand had already assembled independently.
"I didn't know he'd actually hurt you," she told investigators, according to the report I eventually read. "I thought he meant something else. Something that would just — end things. Not this."
I don't know that I believe her. I've stopped needing to.
---
I sat across from Desmond exactly once before the trial, in a supervised meeting his own attorney had requested, apparently believing I might be persuaded toward some version of leniency given our history together.
"I loved you," he told me, his voice carrying none of the confidence I'd once found so compelling. "This isn't who I actually am."
"I heard you," I said. "Standing in that room, six days after you paid a man to disfigure me. You asked who would ever want me now. That is exactly who you actually are."
"I panicked. The whole thing spiraled out of control."
"You applied for a marriage license with another woman while I was still unconscious from the attack you arranged. That isn't panic, Desmond. That's a plan."
He didn't have an answer for that. I stood, gathered my folder of evidence I'd carried in more out of habit than necessity, and left without saying anything further.
---
