Chapter 4 - What the Police Found
Officer Marcus Hayes met me at the house.
Another patrol car blocked the driveway.
My neighbor Mark stood on his lawn wearing slippers and a robe.
“I didn’t see anyone enter.”
“Did you see anyone leave?”
“No.”
The back door had not actually opened.
The sensor had been triggered remotely.
That mattered.
Someone had tried to make it appear as if there had been movement in the house.
Officer Hayes walked beside me toward the hallway.
“Don’t touch anything.”
The locked door waited at the end.
I gave him permission to force it open.
One strike from a pry bar cracked the frame.
The door swung inward.
I had imagined boxes.
Instead, there was a desk.
Two monitors.
A printer.
A locking file cabinet.
Three prepaid cell phones.
A paper shredder.
And a small camera system separate from the cameras installed throughout our home.
Officer Hayes stopped.
“This isn’t storage.”
“No.”
The monitors were dark.
One wall contained shelves filled with binders.
Most were labeled with dates.
Some went back six years.
One contained my name.
DANIEL REED.
Another said LILY.
Another said THOMAS.
My stomach turned.
Hayes pulled on gloves.
“We need detectives.”
“What is this?”
“I don’t know yet.”
On the desk sat a family photograph.
Rachel and me at the beach.
Lily between us.
Baby Tommy in Rachel’s arms.
Someone had circled my face with a black marker.
Underneath, Rachel had written three words.
HE CANNOT KNOW.
I recognized her handwriting.
My legs nearly gave out.
Officer Hayes steadied me.
“Sit down.”
“No.”
I stepped toward the shelves.
“Whatever this is, my daughter was terrified of it.”
Hayes stopped me from touching the binders.
Then his flashlight caught something under the desk.
A black duffel bag.
Inside were stacks of cash.
Passports.
Four driver’s licenses with Rachel’s photograph.
None used the name Rachel Reed.
Rachel Collins.
Rebecca Hart.
Emily Sloan.
Laura Mitchell.
Different birth dates.
Same face.
Same woman I had married.
The detective arrived thirty minutes later.
Her name was Sofia Ramirez.
She studied the IDs before asking me a question that made my stomach drop.
“Mr. Reed, how did you meet your wife?”
“At Stanford.”
“And before Stanford?”
“She grew up in Oregon.”
“Parents?”
“Dead.”
“Family?”
“She said there was nobody.”
Ramirez looked at the false identities.
“Did you ever verify any of that?”
Why would I have?
She was my wife.
The mother of my children.
The person sleeping beside me every night.
Then another officer opened the file cabinet.
Inside was a stack of legal documents.
Bank statements.
Insurance policies.
And a passport application for Lily.
Beside it was another for Tommy.
Both applications had passport photographs attached.
Neither listed me as their father.
The travel date was three days from now.
Destination.
Argentina.
I stared at the papers.
Rachel had not abandoned our children.
She had been preparing to take them.
The question was why she left them behind.
Detective Ramirez slowly closed the file.
“We need to find your wife before she realizes we found this room.”
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
A man said only one sentence.
May you like
“Daniel, if you want your wife alive, stop opening her files.”
Then he disconnected.
