Chapter 2 - THE MAN UPSTAIRS Daniel didn’t move.
Neither did Vanessa.
The sound had been unmistakable.
A door.
Closing.
Upstairs.
“Lily.”
Daniel spoke without taking his eyes from the second floor.
“Go outside.”
“But Dad—”
“Now.”
She hesitated.
Daniel turned.
“Find Officer Reynolds. Stay with him.”
Police had arrived behind the ambulance and were still near the driveway.
Lily ran.
Vanessa suddenly moved toward the stairs.
Daniel grabbed her arm.
“Where are you going?”
“To see who’s up there.”
“No.”
“You think I know?”
“I think you know a lot more than you’re telling me.”
Footsteps sounded overhead.
Daniel released Vanessa and looked upward.
A shadow crossed the hallway.
“Police!” he shouted. “Come downstairs!”
Nothing.
Daniel pulled out his phone and called the officers outside.
“There’s someone inside the house.”
Within moments, two officers entered.
They moved upstairs.
Daniel waited below.
Every second felt impossibly long.
Then—
“Clear!”
A bedroom door opened.
Another officer shouted.
“Movement toward the west hall!”
Running footsteps.
A crash.
Glass shattered somewhere upstairs.
Daniel started forward.
Vanessa grabbed him.
“Don’t.”
He looked at her.
For the first time, she appeared genuinely afraid.
“You know who it is.”
“No.”
“You do.”
“Daniel, listen to me—”
A police officer appeared above them.
“Mr. Mercer?”
“Yes?”
“There’s nobody upstairs.”
Daniel frowned.
“I heard someone.”
“We found an open balcony door.”
The officer held something.
A black leather glove.
“This was beside it.”
Vanessa stared at the glove.
Daniel noticed.
“You recognize it.”
“No.”
“You looked like you did.”
“I’m scared.”
Daniel stepped closer.
“So am I.”
His voice dropped.
“But I’m done being confused in my own house.”
Police separated Daniel and Vanessa for questioning.
Detective Rachel Sloan arrived twenty minutes later.
She watched Lily’s recording twice.
Then a third time.
“This proves there was a confrontation,” she said.
“It proves Vanessa caused Elena’s fall.”
“The angle is partially blocked.”
Daniel stared at her.
“You’re kidding.”
“I’m telling you what a defense attorney would say.”
Daniel looked toward Vanessa, who sat across the room speaking with another officer.
“What about what Elena said?”
“That matters. But we need her conscious.”
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
“And my wife?”
Sloan looked at him.
“You’re saying your daughter believes Ms. Hale discussed your late wife’s death?”
“She heard her.”
“Did she record that conversation?”
“No.”
“Then we investigate.”
Daniel hated the calmness of the answer.
But Sloan was right.
Suspicion wasn’t proof.
Lily approached them.
“Dad?”
He immediately crouched.
“What is it?”
“I have another video.”
Daniel froze.
Sloan leaned forward.
“Another video of what?”
“I don’t know.”
Lily unlocked her phone.
“Elena told me if anything happened to her, I should look in a folder she made.”
Daniel stared.
“What folder?”
Lily tapped the screen.
A hidden folder appeared.
Inside were photographs.
Documents.
Audio recordings.
And videos.
Dozens of them.
Detective Sloan’s expression changed.
“Don’t open anything else.”
Daniel looked at her.
“Why?”
“Because this may now be evidence.”
Vanessa saw them.
“What is she showing you?”
No one answered.
Her face changed.
She stood.
“I want my attorney.”
Sloan nodded.
“That would be wise.”
Daniel watched Vanessa being escorted into another room.
Then his phone rang.
The hospital.
He answered immediately.
“Mr. Mercer?”
“Yes.”
“Elena Ruiz is conscious.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
“Can she talk?”
“Briefly.”
“I’m coming.”
At the hospital, Elena looked impossibly small beneath the white sheets.
Her arm was fractured.
Three ribs were broken.
She had suffered a concussion.
But she was alive.
Daniel sat beside her.
“I’m sorry.”
Elena frowned.
“For what?”
“For not seeing what was happening in my own house.”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“You trusted someone you loved.”
“I should have trusted you too.”
She looked away.
Daniel hesitated.
“Elena, what did Vanessa do to Lily?”
Elena’s expression darkened.
“She controlled her.”
“How?”
“Fear.”
Daniel felt anger rise.
“She told Lily you didn’t want her anymore. That after the wedding, you would send her to boarding school.”
“I would never—”
“I know.”
“What else?”
Elena closed her eyes.
“She intercepted letters from Lily’s grandparents. She deleted messages. She made the child believe everyone was leaving.”
Daniel felt physically sick.
“Why?”
“To isolate you both.”
“Why?”
Elena looked at him.
“Because Lily remembered something.”
Daniel leaned forward.
“What?”
“Your wife’s accident.”
Daniel’s pulse hammered.
“Elena…”
“She was in the car.”
“No. Lily was home.”
“That’s what the police report says.”
Daniel stared at her.
Elena whispered:
“But Lily was there.”
The room seemed to tilt.
“That’s impossible.”
“Ask her.”
Daniel stood.
“Why would anyone lie about that?”
Elena’s eyes filled with fear.
“Because your wife didn’t lose control of the car.”
Daniel could barely speak.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying someone forced her off the road.”
Daniel stepped backward.
“No.”
“And Lily saw the other car.”
Daniel thought of his daughter.
Eight years old at the time.
Traumatized.
Weeks of nightmares.
Therapy.
Fragments of memory.
He had assumed grief caused them.
Maybe they hadn’t been nightmares.
Maybe they had been memories.
“Who was driving?”
Elena’s answer came slowly.
“I don’t know.”
Daniel exhaled.
Then Elena added:
“But Vanessa does.”
His phone buzzed.
A message.
Unknown number.
Daniel opened it.
There was a photograph.
Lily.
Standing outside the hospital.
Taken less than a minute earlier.
Below it were five words.
STOP DIGGING INTO THE ACCIDENT.
Daniel ran.
He burst through the hospital corridor.
“LILY!”
Detective Sloan appeared near the elevators.
“What happened?”
Daniel showed her the phone.
Her expression hardened.
“Where is your daughter?”
“With Officer Reynolds.”
They ran downstairs.
Reynolds stood beside the emergency entrance.
Alone.
Daniel’s blood went cold.
“Where’s Lily?”
The officer turned.
“She went inside with you.”
“No, she didn’t.”
Reynolds stared.
“A woman came out. Said you sent her.”
“What woman?”
“Blonde. Silver dress.”
Daniel stopped.
Vanessa.
But Vanessa was supposed to be with police.
Sloan immediately grabbed her radio.
“Locate Vanessa Hale.”
Static.
Then an officer answered.
“Detective…”
A pause.
“She’s gone.”
Daniel’s stomach dropped.
His phone buzzed again.
Another photograph.
This one showed Lily sitting inside a vehicle.
Terrified.
The message beneath it read:
YOU HAVE SOMETHING THAT BELONGS TO ME.
Daniel looked at Sloan.
“What does she want?”
Elena’s hidden files.
Then another message arrived.
MIDNIGHT. COME ALONE.
And beneath it—
May you like
an address Daniel recognized immediately.
The canyon road where his wife had died.
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