Chapter 3
I stared at Lily so long that she thought I hadn't heard her.
“Daddy?”
I forced myself to answer.
“What do you mean Mommy put a camera downstairs?”
Lily pointed toward the basement again.
“Behind the books.”
Daniel looked at me.
“Rachel installed another camera?”
“I don't know.”
“You never saw it?”
“No.”
Lily tugged my sleeve.
“Mommy said it was secret.”
I crouched beside her.
“When did she tell you that?”
Lily frowned, trying to remember.
“She showed me when I was little.”
“You are little.”
Daniel gave me a warning glance.
I softened my voice.
“Sorry, sweetheart. Do you remember why Mommy said it was secret?”
Lily nodded.
“So nobody could make it stop.”
A chill ran through me.
Rachel had died when Lily was two.
What could she possibly have been afraid of back then?
Daniel took Lily upstairs to wash her face while I went downstairs.
I hadn't entered the basement since watching the recordings.
Every step felt heavier than the last.
The basement had once been Rachel's favorite room.
We had turned half of it into a playroom before Lily was born.
White shelves.
A small couch.
Toy bins.
A cheap wooden bookcase anchored to the wall.
I knelt beside it.
Nothing.
I moved a row of children's books.
Nothing.
Then I noticed a tiny black circle between the back panel and the wall.
My heart started pounding.
I pulled the bookcase forward.
A small camera had been taped behind it.
Old.
Dusty.
Still connected to a cable that disappeared through the baseboard.
“What the hell?”
Daniel had come downstairs.
I pointed.
“Lily was right.”
We followed the cable into a storage closet.
Behind a stack of old moving boxes was a small black recording unit.
Daniel stared at me.
“You've had this in your house for years?”
“Apparently.”
I knelt beside it.
A tiny green light was still glowing.
Daniel let out a breath.
“It's still on.”
I didn't touch it.
After everything the police had said, I knew better.
“We call Ramirez.”
She returned forty minutes later with another officer.
By then Lily was asleep upstairs in my bed with the door open and Daniel sitting nearby.
Ramirez photographed the camera.
Then the recording unit.
“Any idea why your late wife installed this?”
“None.”
“When did she die?”
“Two years ago.”
“How?”
The question still hurt.
“Car accident.”
“Was anyone else involved?”
“A truck crossed the center line.”
“Driver survive?”
“Yes.”
She looked at me.
“Anything suspicious about the crash?”
“No.”
At least, I had never thought so.
Ramirez called a detective.
By midnight, the basement had become a crime scene.
I sat at the kitchen table alone.
That was when I noticed Rachel's old recipe box on top of the refrigerator.
It had been there for years.
I don't know why I noticed it then.
Maybe because everything suddenly felt like a message from a dead woman I had failed to understand.
I pulled it down.
Inside were handwritten recipes.
Pancakes.
Chicken soup.
Lily's favorite banana bread.
Then I found an envelope.
My name was written across it.
ETHAN.
My hands went cold.
I opened it.
Inside was a single piece of paper.
If you're reading this because you found the camera, don't confront anyone until you watch May 14.
Rachel.
That was all.
I nearly dropped the note.
May 14.
Three weeks before Rachel died.
I called Ramirez immediately.
She came back to the kitchen.
I handed her the note without speaking.
She read it twice.
“Where was this?”
“Recipe box.”
“Did you know it existed?”
“No.”
She placed it carefully into an evidence sleeve.
“What happened May fourteenth?”
“I don't know.”
“Think.”
I tried.
Two years earlier.
May.
Lily had just turned two.
Rachel had been working part-time from home.
I had been traveling constantly for work.
My mother, Carol, sometimes helped with Lily.
Daniel visited.
Neighbors came over.
Friends.
Then one name surfaced.
Vanessa.
I looked at Ramirez.
“I knew Vanessa before Rachel died.”
Her eyebrows rose.
“How well?”
“Not well.”
That was true.
Vanessa had worked in the same office building as me.
Different company.
We sometimes bought coffee at the same place downstairs.
Rachel had met her twice.
Once at an office holiday party.
Once when Vanessa brought paperwork to my house after I accidentally left a folder in the lobby.
Ramirez watched my expression.
“You're thinking about her.”
“Yes.”
“Was she at your house on May fourteenth?”
“I don't know.”
The detective arrived just before one in the morning.
Detective Helen Cho.
She was calm, quiet, and impossible to read.
She listened while I explained the camera.
Then she said, “We're going to take the recording unit.”
“When can we see what's on it?”
“When it's properly copied.”
“How long?”
She looked at me.
“I know you want answers. But if this becomes evidence, we do it correctly.”
I nodded.
She studied Rachel's note.
Then she asked a question I wasn't prepared for.
“Did your wife ever tell you she was afraid of someone?”
“No.”
“Did she ever accuse you of cheating?”
I stared at her.
“No.”
“Did you cheat?”
“No.”
“Did Vanessa ever express romantic interest in you before Rachel's death?”
My stomach tightened.
“Once.”
Daniel looked at me from across the room.
I had never told him.
Cho leaned forward.
“Explain.”
“About four months before Rachel died, Vanessa asked me to dinner.”
“And?”
“I told her I was married.”
“What did she say?”
“That she didn't mean it like that.”
“Did you believe her?”
“No.”
“Did you tell Rachel?”
“No.”
Cho didn't react.
“Why?”
“Because nothing happened.”
Daniel shook his head.
I knew what he was thinking.
Stupid.
And he was right.
Cho continued.
“When did you begin dating Vanessa?”
“Eight months after Rachel died.”
“Who contacted whom?”
“She contacted me.”
“How?”
“Sent flowers to the office on the anniversary of Rachel's death.”
Daniel's head snapped up.
“What?”
I looked at him.
“She said she remembered the date.”
“That's not normal, Ethan.”
“I know that now.”
At the time, I had thought it was kindness.
I had been lonely.
Exhausted.
Trying to raise a grieving toddler while barely functioning myself.
Vanessa appeared when I was drowning.
She brought meals.
She offered to babysit.
She remembered Rachel's birthday.
She listened when I talked.
And eventually, I let her into our lives.
The shame was crushing.
Cho closed her notebook.
“Don't blame yourself for things we haven't established.”
I almost laughed.
“My daughter was locked in a dark basement while I worked late.”
“That part is established.”
“Exactly.”
“And you called police when you discovered it.”
“After I put my hands on Vanessa.”
Cho held my gaze.
“Yes.”
There was no comfort in her voice.
Just truth.
“You will have to deal with that separately.”
“I know.”
“But right now we're investigating possible abuse of your daughter and whatever your late wife recorded.”
At two in the morning, everyone finally left.
Daniel refused to go home.
He slept on the couch.
I lay beside Lily.
She was curled beneath my blanket holding the stuffed rabbit Rachel had bought her.
At three seventeen, my phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered quietly.
“Hello?”
No response.
Then breathing.
Slow.
Controlled.
“Who is this?”
A woman's voice whispered.
“You should have left the camera buried.”
I sat upright.
“Vanessa?”
The caller disconnected.
I called Detective Cho.
She told me not to delete the call log.
Then she asked whether the doors were locked.
I checked every one.
At sunrise, Lily woke up and asked for noodles.
So I made them.
At seven in the morning.
She ate three bites.
Then looked at me.
“Daddy?”
“Yes?”
“Is Vanessa coming back?”
“No.”
“Ever?”
I hesitated.
“No one is going to make you live with her.”
She nodded.
Then she asked, “Did Mommy know Vanessa was mean?”
I froze.
“Why would you ask that?”
Lily stared into her bowl.
“Because Mommy cried after Vanessa came over.”
The spoon slipped from my hand.
“When?”
“A long time ago.”
“Do you remember what they said?”
Lily shook her head.
Then she whispered, “Mommy told her to stay away from you.”
I felt the room tilt.
Before I could ask another question, someone knocked on the front door.
Daniel walked in from the living room.
“Expecting anyone?”
“No.”
I checked the camera.
A woman stood outside holding a folder.
I recognized her.
Marissa Cole.
Rachel's best friend.
I hadn't seen her since the funeral.
I opened the door.
She looked exhausted.
“Ethan.”
“Marissa?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“I heard about Vanessa.”
“How?”
“Detective Cho called me.”
She held up the folder.
“I should've given you this two years ago.”
My heart pounded.
“What is it?”
She looked past me toward Lily.
Then lowered her voice.
“Rachel gave me letters before she died.”
I stared at her.
“Letters about Vanessa.”
My throat closed.
Marissa began crying.
“She thought Vanessa was trying to destroy your marriage.”
I took a step back.
“And that's not the worst part.”
“What is?”
Marissa opened the folder.
Inside was a photograph.
Vanessa standing beside Rachel's car.
May you like
The photograph had been taken three days before Rachel died.
Vanessa's hand was reaching underneath the hood.
