Chapter 16
Life settled into a rhythm.
A good rhythm.
Chloe was thriving in school. Her art teacher said she had real talent. She’d made new friends. She was sleeping through the night. The nightmares were becoming less frequent.
Lila was doing well too. She’d been sober for over a year now. She was talking about going back to school, getting her nursing degree. She’d met someone—a nice man who worked at the bookstore down the street. She was happy.
And me?
I was happy too.
Work was good.
Home was good.
For the first time in years, I felt like I could breathe.
But then, three months after Grant’s sentencing, it started again.
Small things at first.
A car parked outside our house for hours at a time.
A hang-up call in the middle of the night.
A dead flower left on our porch.
I told myself I was being paranoid.
That it was just coincidence.
That Grant was in prison.
That Richard was tied up with his own legal problems.
But the incidents kept happening.
And they kept getting worse.
One morning, I went out to get the newspaper.
And found our family dog—an old golden retriever we’d adopted just a month earlier—lying on the porch.
Dead.
His neck was broken.
A note was pinned to his collar.
It said: You took my son. I’ll take yours.
The police came.
They took the dog.
They took the note.
They dusted for prints.
But there was nothing.
No evidence.
No leads.
“Probably just a sick prank,” the officer said, though he didn’t look like he believed it. “We’ll patrol the neighborhood more. You should install more cameras. Maybe get a security system.”
We already had a security system.
We already had cameras.
Whoever had done this had avoided them all.
This wasn’t a prank.
This was Richard Holloway.
I called Mara.
She came over immediately.
“Richard is out on bail,” she said. “His trial is in six months. He has the money, the motive, and the connections to do this. And he’s got nothing left to lose. Grant is in prison for life. His wife left him. His company is crumbling. He’s a broken man. And broken men do desperate things.”
“What do we do?”
“We go on the offensive. We file a motion to revoke his bail. We present this as evidence of witness tampering and intimidation. We get him put in jail before his trial.”
“Will it work?”
Mara looked at the note.
“It should. This is a direct threat. And it’s exactly the kind of thing judges hate. But Richard is smart. He’ll have covered his tracks. We need proof. Actual proof that he’s behind this.”
“How do we get that?”
“I have an idea. But it’s risky.”
“Tell me.”
Mara looked at me.
“Richard wants to get to Chloe. He wants to hurt you through her. We give him the opportunity. We make it look like Chloe is vulnerable. And we catch him in the act.”
My blood ran cold.
“Use my daughter as bait?”
“Not really. We’d have police everywhere. She’d never be in any real danger. But if Richard thinks he has a chance to get to her… he’ll take it. He’s desperate. And desperate people make mistakes.”
I thought about it.
The dead dog on our porch.
The threats.
The feeling of being watched.
I couldn’t live like this.
I couldn’t let Chloe live like this.
We had to end it.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s do it.”
The plan was simple.
We would announce that Chloe was going to an art camp for the weekend.
A camp two hours outside of town.
A camp with minimal security.
A camp where a desperate grandfather might think he could “rescue” his granddaughter.
The police would be waiting.
Undercover.
Everywhere.
If Richard showed up, he’d be caught red-handed.
Chloe was scared when we told her.
But she was brave.
“I want him to stop,” she said. “I want us to be safe. I’ll do it.”
The weekend of the “art camp” arrived.
We dropped Chloe off at a friend’s house.
Then we drove to the camp, two hours away, with a police decoy who looked roughly like Chloe from a distance.
The police were already in position.
Hidden in the woods.
Hidden in the camp buildings.
Hidden on the roads.
We waited.
And waited.
Friday night.
Nothing.
Saturday morning.
Nothing.
Saturday afternoon.
Nothing.
I was starting to think we’d been wrong.
That Richard wasn’t coming.
That we’d put Chloe through all this fear for nothing.
And then, at three o’clock on Saturday afternoon, a car pulled up to the camp entrance.
A black SUV.
Tinted windows.
No license plates.
It stopped at the gate.
A man got out.
Not Richard.
Someone else.
A big man.
Muscular.
He was wearing a hoodie.
He walked up to the gate.
He looked around.
And then he pulled something out of his pocket.
A tool.
He started working on the lock.
The police moved in.
Officers poured out of the woods.
They surrounded the man before he could react.
He was cuffed and on the ground in seconds.
I ran over.
The man looked up.
I didn’t recognize him.
“Who are you working for?” I demanded.
He spat at me.
“Richard Holloway says hello.”
The police searched the SUV.
Inside, they found chloroform.
Rope.
Duct tape.
A change of clothes for a young girl.
And a handwritten note.
It said: Bring her to the old warehouse on River Road. No police. Or she dies.
Richard had planned to kidnap Chloe.
And then what?
Kill her?
Hold her for ransom?
Either way, he’d meant to hurt her.
Badly.
The police went to Richard’s house.
But he was gone.
He’d vanished.
His wife was gone too.
His passport was gone.
His car was gone.
Half his money was gone.
He’d run.
A manhunt was launched.
The FBI got involved.
Richard Holloway was now a fugitive.
We went home.
Chloe was safe.
Richard had been stopped.
But he was still out there.
Free.
Angry.
May you like
Desperate.
And now, he had nothing left to lose.
