Chapter 6 - The Original Audition
Monica arrived before breakfast.
This time, she brought an investigator.
His name was Jonah Reed.
He spent two hours making forensic copies of Diane’s phone.
Nobody deleted anything.
Nobody forwarded anything unnecessarily.
Nobody touched the evidence without him documenting it.
Then he found the video.
It had been hidden inside a private message thread from eight months earlier.
The recording showed Chloe standing in front of a white backdrop.
Vanessa stood beside the camera.
Diane was behind her.
Chloe smiled.
Vanessa frowned.
“Again.”
Chloe smiled wider.
“Again.”
By the seventh attempt, Chloe’s eyes were wet.
Then Lily wandered into the room.
She must have been visiting Diane that afternoon.
She was holding a stuffed rabbit.
“Can Chloe play now?”
Someone behind the camera laughed.
Lily smiled.
That was it.
No posing.
No coaching.
No makeup.
Just a five-year-old asking for her cousin.
Martin Vale’s voice came from behind the camera.
“Who is that?”
Vanessa immediately stopped recording.
But the next clip began minutes later.
Lily stood beside Chloe.
Martin was speaking to Diane.
“She has something.”
Vanessa’s voice sharpened.
“We’re here for Chloe.”
“I know.”
“Then shoot Chloe.”
“I am.”
“But?”
There was a long pause.
Then Martin said it.
“The other little girl is more marketable.”
I hated the word instantly.
Marketable.
As though Lily were cereal on a grocery shelf.
The messages after that were worse.
Martin repeatedly asked for parental consent.
Diane claimed she could handle it.
Vanessa sent my personal information.
My address.
My date of birth.
A photograph of my driver’s license.
I looked at Ryan.
“How did she get that?”
His face fell.
“Mom helped us refinance the house two years ago.”
Diane had copies of everything.
They used those documents to create digital signatures.
They opened the trust.
They signed release forms.
And they kept submitting Lily.
Without us.
Monica scrolled further.
Then she stopped.
“There.”
A message from Vanessa.
If Lily isn’t available for EverBelle, they’ll reconsider Chloe.
Martin answered.
Don’t do anything stupid.
Vanessa replied with a laughing emoji.
Three days later, she cut Lily’s hair.
I felt nauseated.
Ryan walked away from the table.
He stood at the window for a long time.
Then he turned back.
“I want them charged.”
Monica nodded.
“That process has already started.”
I looked at her.
“What do you mean?”
“I sent the initial evidence package to the police this morning.”
Ryan exhaled.
Then Monica’s expression changed.
“There’s something else.”
She opened a spreadsheet recovered from Diane’s phone.
Rows of names appeared.
Children.
Dozens of them.
Payments.
Contracts.
Parent signatures.
I stared at her.
“What is that?”
Monica looked at Jonah.
Jonah answered.
May you like
“I don’t think Lily was the first child.”
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