Chapter 8 - The Officer at the Birthday Table
Officer Daniel Ross raised both hands when Mara aimed at him.
“Detective, listen to me.”
“Remove your weapon and place it on the floor.”
Ross obeyed.
Amy remained inside the pantry with Evelyn’s ledger pressed against her chest.
“You were assigned to secure this house,” Mara said.
“I was.”
“Then why did the first team stop responding?”
“I didn’t arrange that.”
“How did you enter without announcing yourself?”
“The front door was open.”
“It was locked ten minutes ago.”
Ross looked toward the hall.
“Then someone else is inside.”
A crash sounded upstairs.
Mara ordered Amy to remain in the pantry and followed Ross toward the staircase. Additional officers entered through the front door moments later.
They searched every room.
A window in Teresa’s temporary bedroom stood open. The curtains moved in the night air.
On the carpet lay a broken picture frame and a single black glove.
Whoever had entered was gone.
Mara returned to the pantry.
“Ross says he came because he received a message from Ryan.”
“Ryan is in custody.”
“I know.”
Ross held out his phone.
The message had been sent from Ryan’s number.
Winter safe. Midnight. Vale is coming.
Amy studied the officer.
“Why did you believe it?”
Ross looked uncomfortable.
“Because I know Malcolm Vale.”
Mara’s eyes narrowed.
“How?”
“He paid my father thirty years ago to alter a traffic report. My father kept copies of everything. When he died, I found files connecting Vale to false identities and suspicious property transfers.”
“Why didn’t you report them?”
“I did. The evidence disappeared, and the internal investigator who received it retired the next week.”
“Why were you at Amy’s house today?”
“I requested the call when I heard her name over dispatch.”
Amy tightened her grip on the ledger.
“You knew who I was?”
“I knew your grandmother’s name. My father’s files referred to a child called Winter.”
Mara looked at the compartment.
“Project Winter.”
Ross nodded.
“Vale was preparing an identity for Amy before she was born.”
“What kind of identity?” Amy asked.
“One he could activate if Rose ever tried to escape him. Dead, missing, criminal, mentally unstable. He created several possible records.”
Amy thought of Teresa’s carefully prepared story.
Amy became confused.
Amy refused help.
Amy threatened to leave with the children.
They had not invented those accusations at the birthday party.
They had selected them from a plan written before Amy could walk.
Ross looked toward the envelope bearing Amy’s name.
“Is there a deposit box number?”
Mara did not answer.
Amy opened the envelope.
Inside was a bank key and a note.
The note contained four words.
Trust the frightened one first.
Amy looked up.
“Who is the frightened one?”
Ross’s face changed.
Before he could answer, Mara’s phone rang.
It was the hospital.
Connor and the children were safe, but Teresa had disappeared from police supervision.
A woman posing as Teresa’s attorney had presented valid court credentials and arranged her release for questioning at another location.
The credentials belonged to an attorney who had died three years earlier.
Amy immediately called Connor.
He answered on the first ring.
“I just heard,” he said.
“Lock the room.”
“It’s already locked.”
“Do not let anyone inside unless Mara confirms who they are.”
“Amy, there’s something else.”
“What?”
“Lily remembered where Grandma kept a second phone.”
Amy heard Lily speaking in the background.
Connor continued.
“She says Teresa used it every night after we went to sleep.”
“Did you find it?”
“Yes.”
“Who did she call?”
“There are no saved names. Just one number, every night at 2:17.”
“Did you call it?”
“No.”
A phone began ringing inside Teresa’s bedroom.
Amy turned toward the sound.
It came from beneath the bed.
Ross pulled out a black phone.
The screen showed an incoming call from Connor’s number.
Connor had not called the hidden phone.
Someone at the hospital had used his identity again.
Ross answered without speaking.
May you like
A woman whispered, “The frightened one is ready.”
Then Lily screamed through Connor’s open line.
