Chapter 10 - WHAT THEY ALREADY KNEW ABOUT US
The petition contained details that should not have been available to Harbor Path.
Dad’s military rescue history.
His school-district pension.
The medication he took for his heart.
The make and license number of his truck.
My occupational-health consulting firm.
The value range of my mother’s trust.
Even the code phrase Dad and I used during genuine emergencies.
I need you here.
That phrase had never appeared in public court records.
My therapist knew it.
Dad knew it.
I knew it.
Rebecca knew only that we maintained an emergency plan, not the words themselves.
“Did you write it anywhere?” Morgan asked.
I thought of the legal archive inside my new house.
After the trials, I had stored therapy plans, protective orders, letters, and financial records in labeled boxes.
The emergency plan was inside one folder.
Dad held a spare key to my front door.
No one else did.
“I wrote it once.”
“Where?”
“My house.”
Dad looked at me.
“I have never opened your archive.”
“I know.”
Morgan did not ask whether I trusted him.
Trust was not the question.
“Who knows he has a key?” she asked.
“The locksmith. Possibly the real-estate agent. Anyone who saw us outside when he placed it on his key ring.”
Dad removed the ring from his pocket.
The brass house key remained attached.
Beside it was the small plastic tag from the locksmith.
A serial number had been written on the back.
Someone could use that number to request a duplicate only if the locksmith failed to verify ownership.
The locksmith had not failed.
His records showed that a woman called two weeks earlier claiming to be me.
She knew the installation date.
The property address.
The invoice number.
She requested two additional keys.
The employee refused because the caller could not provide the security phrase I had selected.
The phrase was my mother’s middle name.
Helen had no middle name.
That was why I chose it.
The caller tried three guesses.
Then hung up.
Someone had already been searching for a way into my house.
Dad’s hospital discharge was delayed one night.
He was medically stable by morning.
I wanted to tell him he should stay with me.
The sentence reached my mouth before I examined it.
“You should—”
I stopped.
Dad waited.
“Do you want to stay at my house until we understand what happened?”
“Do you want me there?”
“Yes.”
“Because you are afraid?”
“Yes.”
“Because you believe I cannot decide for myself?”
“No.”
“Then I’ll stay for three nights.”
“What happens after three nights?”
“We ask again.”
That evening, he entered my house using the spare key only after knocking.
The distinction looked unnecessary from outside.
It was not unnecessary to us.
We checked the legal archive together.
Nothing appeared disturbed.
The emergency plan remained inside its folder.
But the folder was upside down.
I always stored the labeled edge toward the door.
Dad noticed something else.
A faint circle marked the dust on the shelf.
An object had rested there recently.
“What was missing?” Morgan asked when she arrived.
I knew before I completed the inventory.
The letters.
Preston’s admission.
May you like
Lorraine’s confession.
Both were gone.
