Chapter 6 - Sarah’s Failed Escape
Sarah planned to leave on Friday morning while David attended a meeting.
She packed clothes for herself and the children into school backpacks. She placed the grocery receipt containing Northbridge’s information inside her shoe and hid the bank statement photograph on an online account.
At 8:30, David drove away.
At 8:42, Sarah took the children toward the back door.
The security alarm activated before she touched the handle.
Metal shutters began lowering across the ground-floor windows.
Sarah stared in disbelief.
David’s voice came through the living room speaker.
“Where are you going?”
Chloe grabbed Ethan’s hand.
Sarah looked toward the camera hidden in the clock.
“Open the door.”
“You’re not thinking clearly.”
“Open the door, David.”
“I’m coming home.”
The connection ended.
Sarah took the children upstairs. She told them to stay in their bedroom and lock the door. Then she returned to the kitchen and searched for anything she could use to disable the alarm.
David arrived nine minutes later.
He was calm.
That frightened her more than shouting would have.
He placed the backpacks on the kitchen table and removed each item slowly.
“You were going to take my children.”
“They’re our children.”
“Not after what you’ve been doing.”
“What have I been doing?”
David opened a drawer and removed several prescription bottles bearing Sarah’s name.
She had never seen them before.
“I have records showing you stopped taking your medication,” he said. “I have videos of you crying, forgetting things, and behaving irrationally.”
“You recorded arguments you created.”
“A judge will see an unstable mother.”
Sarah finally understood why the cameras existed.
They were not only tools of control.
May you like
They were part of a story David was building about her.
A story he intended to tell after she disappeared from the children’s lives.
