Chapter 4 - Claire Comes Home
Claire landed at 11:18 p.m. with no checked luggage and a face that looked ten years older than it had that morning.
I met her outside Sophia's room because I did not want our daughter waking to panic.
Claire grabbed my arms before she said anything.
"Where is she?"
"Sleeping."
"Is she breathing okay?"
"Better than when we came in."
"Can I see her?"
"Of course."
Claire stepped inside and stopped beside the bed.
Sophia had been moved to a pediatric room upstairs, where the lights were dim and a painted moon smiled from one wall.
Claire covered her mouth with one hand.
"She looks so little."
"She is little."
The words came out harder than I intended.
Claire flinched.
I regretted it immediately.
"I'm sorry."
"No."
She shook her head.
"Don't apologize to me."
Sophia stirred.
"Mommy?"
Claire bent over her so quickly that the chair scraped backward.
"I'm here."
Sophia reached one hand from under the blanket.
Claire took it and pressed it to her cheek.
"I'm sorry I was gone."
"Did you lose your job?"
Claire froze.
"What?"
"Aunt Sarah said if I bothered her you had to come home and lose your job."
Claire closed her eyes.
"Sweetheart, I was not at work."
"You weren't?"
"No."
"Then why did she say that?"
Claire looked at me as if she wanted an answer I could not give.
"I don't know."
Sophia's eyes drifted closed again.
Claire stayed beside the bed for almost twenty minutes without moving.
When we stepped into the hallway, she turned on me.
"Where is Sarah?"
"She left the house."
"You let her leave?"
"I wasn't there."
"Your people were."
"My people are not a private army."
"She did this to our child."
"And that is why I am not giving her a defense attorney's dream by having soldiers drag her off my driveway."
Claire paced two steps and stopped.
"I want to see the video."
"Not here."
"I need to see it."
"Claire."
"Ethan, I defended her."
Her voice cracked.
"I need to see what I defended."
I opened the secure copy on my phone.
The first clip showed the patio before I arrived.
At 5:46 p.m., Sarah opened the sliding door and pointed outside.
Sophia stood just inside wearing her pajamas and holding a tissue.
There was no audio from that interior angle, but the body language was unmistakable.
Sophia shook her head.
Sarah pointed again.
Sophia stepped outside.
Sarah closed the door.
Then she lowered the security bar.
Claire's hand flew to her mouth.
The next clip came from an exterior side camera Sarah had apparently not noticed.
Sophia knocked on the glass three minutes later.
Sarah walked past inside without stopping.
At 5:58, Sophia knocked again.
At 6:07, she sat down.
At 6:16, Lucas appeared at the glass and reached for the door.
Sarah entered the frame, pulled him backward, and closed the curtain.
Claire made a broken sound.
"Stop."
I stopped the video.
She bent forward with both hands on her knees.
"She was out there almost forty minutes before you got home."
"At least."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
"No, why would she do this?"
"Control."
Claire looked up.
"What?"
"Sarah wanted Sophia to understand that Sarah decided who belonged in our house."
Claire stared at me.
"You think this was about territory?"
"Partly."
"And the rest?"
I glanced toward the closed hospital-room door.
"Sarah had reasons to want us unstable and divided."
"What reasons?"
"I can tell you some of it now."
We went to a family room at the end of the hall.
I explained that Sarah had worked for Halcyon Dynamics under her maiden name.
Claire's face showed no recognition.
"She told me she worked for a healthcare software company."
"She lied."
"Why?"
"I don't know yet."
"What does Halcyon do?"
"Defense contracting."
Claire sat down.
"You're investigating them?"
"I cannot discuss the assignment."
"But Sarah is connected to it."
"Potentially."
"And she got into your office."
"Yes."
"Did she steal something?"
I did not answer immediately.
Claire knew me well enough to read the pause.
"Oh God."
"A security token is unaccounted for."
"Can it hurt someone?"
"Not by itself."
"Ethan."
"Not by itself."
She stood again.
"So while I was in Chicago drinking wine with Natalie and Jess, my sister was abusing our daughter and stealing from a colonel in Army Intelligence."
I gave her the only honest answer available.
"That is what the evidence currently suggests."
Claire laughed once, but there was no humor in it.
"She called you a broke veteran at Thanksgiving."
"I remember."
"She told my mother you were living off me."
"I remember that too."
"Why didn't you correct her?"
"Because I did not need her respect."
Claire looked toward Sophia's room.
"But Sophia needed protection from her contempt."
That landed where it should.
"Yes."
Neither of us tried to soften it.
At 12:03 a.m., Deputy Ruiz arrived at the hospital to take my formal statement.
She also asked to speak with Claire separately.
Claire agreed.
I waited with Sophia while they talked.
Thirty minutes later, Ruiz asked me into the hall.
"We have a problem locating Ms. Bennett."
"She has a phone."
"It's off."
"Vehicle?"
"Her car is still at your house."
"Then someone picked her up."
Ruiz nodded.
"Your neighborhood camera caught a dark sedan at the corner around ten."
"Plate?"
"Obscured."
That was not random.
"Lucas?"
"With his grandmother and safe."
I let out a breath I had not realized I was holding.
Ruiz continued.
"We also found the yellow bucket."
"Where?"
"On the balcony, exactly where your video showed it."
"She told you she threw it away."
"Yes."
"Anything else?"
Ruiz's expression tightened.
"Your wife gave us permission to look at Sarah's messages that came through on a shared family tablet."
"And?"
"There is one I think you should know about."
"From whom?"
"Unknown number."
Ruiz read from her notes.
"You have one night to deliver the token, or the deal is dead."
Claire stepped out of the family room behind her.
"There's more."
She held up her phone.
Sarah had just sent her a photograph.
It showed me in uniform standing beside Marcus at a secure conference event six months earlier.
Across the image, Sarah had typed one sentence.
ASK YOUR HUSBAND WHY HE LIED TO YOU ABOUT WHO HE REALLY IS.
Claire stared at the screen.
Then another message arrived.
May you like
THIS IS ALL HIS FAULT.
