Chapter 4 - Someone Upstairs)
Daniel reached beneath the kitchen counter and pulled out a heavy flashlight.
Mark took the fireplace poker.
Neither spoke.
They moved toward the stairs.
The house was dark except for the kitchen light behind them.
Caitlyn slept on the living room sofa, only twenty feet away.
That changed everything.
Mark pointed to Daniel.
Stay with Caitlyn.
Daniel understood.
He hated it, but he understood.
Mark climbed alone.
The first upstairs room was empty.
The second was Daniel's office.
The door stood slightly open.
Mark pushed it.
Empty.
The third was a guest bedroom.
Nothing.
Then Mark noticed the window at the end of the hallway.
Open.
Cold air moved the curtain.
He approached.
A muddy footprint stained the sill.
Below, a narrow roof extended over the back porch.
Someone had escaped.
Mark ran downstairs.
Daniel was beside Caitlyn.
"Back window."
Daniel grabbed his phone.
They called police.
The responding officers searched the property but found nobody.
One officer discovered tire tracks behind the fence.
Another found a glove near the porch.
Nothing else.
By three in the morning, Caitlyn woke.
She saw police again and immediately panicked.
Mark sat beside her.
"It's okay."
"Did Mom come?"
"No."
"Did Samantha?"
"No."
Caitlyn looked toward the stairs.
"Then who was upstairs?"
Mark wished he could lie.
"I don't know."
Caitlyn leaned against him.
"Daddy?"
"Yeah?"
"Did you hear everything on the little machine?"
"Not yet."
She stared at his face.
"Do you believe me?"
Mark's chest tightened.
"Every word."
She nodded.
That seemed to matter more than anything else.
By sunrise, Mark had listened to fourteen recordings.
The timeline reached back five weeks.
Margaret met repeatedly with Victor.
They discussed parcel numbers.
Insurance.
Custody.
A trust.
Mark's employment.
His temper.
Then Samantha's voice began appearing more frequently.
At first she sounded curious.
Then excited.
She wanted money.
A car.
A private school in California.
Margaret promised everything would change once Bennett Street was settled.
Samantha asked once, "What about Caitlyn?"
Margaret replied, "She'll adjust."
"To what?"
"Wherever she ends up."
Mark stopped the recording.
Daniel stared at him.
"Play it."
"No."
"Mark."
"I said no."
He stood and walked outside.
Morning light covered the neighborhood.
Normal people were leaving for work.
A school bus stopped at the corner.
The ordinary world continued.
Mark felt as though his had been dismantled overnight.
Daniel joined him.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't."
"I brought Victor into company meetings."
"You didn't lock my daughter in that room."
"I gave him access to paperwork."
Mark looked at his brother.
"What paperwork?"
Daniel hesitated.
"Family trust documents."
Mark froze.
Their father had established the Bennett Family Trust twenty years earlier.
The trust originally held three small properties and several investment accounts.
After their father died, Daniel became managing trustee.
Mark received income but rarely participated.
He hated paperwork.
Their father had known that.
"If Caitlyn is my beneficiary," Mark said slowly, "what happens if I'm declared unfit?"
Daniel looked sick.
"Her interest could be managed by a court-appointed guardian."
"Margaret."
"Possibly."
"And if Margaret controls Caitlyn's interest?"
"She gets influence over your trust stake."
Mark looked toward Daniel's house.
"Enough influence to force a sale?"
Daniel did not answer.
He did not need to.
Mark went back inside.
He restarted the recorder.
File fifteen contained static.
Then Victor.
"We still have the problem of Bennett."
Margaret said, "He's predictable."
"Predictable isn't the same as controllable."
"Samantha can provoke him."
Mark closed his eyes.
Victor continued.
"One incident. Recorded. Preferably physical."
Samantha laughed faintly.
"What if he doesn't hit me?"
Margaret's reply was quiet.
"Then we give him something worse to react to."
Mark stopped the file.
The burning bedroom.
The locked door.
They had expected him to arrive.
They had expected him to see Caitlyn in danger.
Then Samantha would provoke him.
If Mark attacked Samantha, cameras might capture it.
An adult man violently attacking a sixteen-year-old.
Police.
Charges.
Protective orders.
Perhaps temporary removal from the home.
Perhaps emergency custody.
But something had gone wrong.
The fire became too dangerous.
Or perhaps it was always supposed to.
"Where were the cameras?" Daniel asked.
Mark looked at him.
"What?"
"If they wanted footage, where were the cameras?"
Mark remembered the work boot.
The hidden recorder.
Then Caitlyn's bedroom.
"Fire investigators."
Daniel understood.
They drove back to Bennett Street.
The street was quieter.
Yellow tape covered the front entrance.
Detective Lisa Moreno met them outside.
Mark told her about the recorder.
All of it.
Moreno listened carefully.
"You should have given this to officers last night."
"I didn't know what was on it."
"You know now."
He handed it over.
Then he asked about cameras.
Moreno's expression changed.
"Why?"
Mark explained.
She called the fire investigator.
Twenty minutes later they entered the damaged bedroom.
Caitlyn stayed with Daniel.
Smoke stains covered the walls.
The bedspread was blackened.
The broken door hung crookedly.
The investigator checked the smoke detector.
Then the vent.
Then a shelf opposite the doorway.
He removed a decorative wooden star from the wall.
Behind it was a tiny hole.
Inside the hole sat a camera.
Mark felt suddenly cold.
Moreno examined it.
"Wireless."
"Who installed it?"
"We'll find out."
The investigator checked another area.
A second camera was hidden inside a clock.
Both pointed toward the door.
Not toward the fire.
Toward whoever entered.
Mark.
The trap had been designed to record him.
Moreno looked at him.
"You were supposed to be filmed."
"Yes."
"Doing what?"
Before Mark answered, his phone rang.
Unknown number.
He almost ignored it.
Then he answered.
"Mark Bennett?"
"Yes."
A man's voice.
"I believe you found our recorder."
Mark looked at Moreno.
She motioned for him to keep talking.
"Who is this?"
"You don't need my name."
"You nearly killed my daughter."
"No."
The caller sounded amused.
"Your wife nearly killed your daughter."
Mark's blood went cold.
"What do you want?"
"The device."
"Police have it."
A pause.
Then the man's tone changed.
"That was unfortunate."
The line went silent.
Mark looked at Moreno.
"He knows."
She immediately began issuing instructions to another officer.
Mark stared at Caitlyn's burned room.
The bedroom had not been the crime.
May you like
It had been a stage.
And someone beyond Margaret and Samantha had been directing it.
