Chapter 2
The officer aimed his gun at Dad’s chest.
“Daniel Carter, put your hands where I can see them.”
Noah clung to Dad’s shirt.
“You’re scaring him,” Dad said.
“Hands up.”
Dad slowly released us.
I stepped between him and the officer.
“My dad didn’t do anything.”
The officer’s name tag read MERCER.
His eyes never left Dad.
“Move aside.”
Melissa suddenly crawled toward the police.
“Thank God you came,” she sobbed. “He would’ve killed me.”
I stared at her.
Less than a minute earlier, she had been holding the belt.
“She’s lying!”
Another officer picked it up with gloved hands.
Mercer barely looked at it.
“Our warrant isn’t about what happened today.”
Dad’s face changed.
“What warrant?”
Mercer pulled a folded document from his vest.
“You’re under arrest for the murder of Sarah Carter.”
The room seemed to tilt beneath me.
Sarah Carter was our mother.
She had died five years earlier when her car went off a bridge during a storm.
Dad had cried beside her empty coffin.
No one had ever called it murder.
Noah looked up at him.
“Dad?”
“This is a mistake,” Dad said.
Mercer ordered him to turn around.
Melissa covered her mouth, pretending to be shocked.
But I saw something in her eyes.
Relief.
The other officers pulled Dad’s arms behind his back.
Noah screamed.
I reached for him, but Melissa grabbed my wrist.
“You’re staying with me.”
I tore away from her.
“I’d rather sleep outside.”
Mercer led Dad toward the door.
Dad twisted around.
“Emma, listen to me.”
It was the first time anyone had said my name since the police arrived.
“Take Noah upstairs. Call Aunt Rebecca.”
Melissa’s head snapped toward him.
“No.”
Dad looked directly at me.
“Tell Rebecca to check your mother’s blue box.”
Melissa went completely still.
Mercer pushed Dad outside before he could say anything else.
I heard neighbors gathering in the street.
Camera flashes appeared beyond the patrol cars.
Someone had called the news.
Melissa walked to the window and watched Dad being placed in the cruiser.
Then she whispered, “He should’ve left the past buried.”
I stepped back.
“You knew they were coming.”
She turned toward me.
The tears were gone.
“Your father has lied to you your entire life.”
Noah pressed against my side.
“You hurt us.”
Melissa smiled coldly.
“And who do you think the police will believe? A grieving widow or two frightened children?”
Officer Elena Ruiz entered from the hallway.
She had found the pantry lock.
She had also seen Noah’s legs.
“Ma’am, turn around.”
Melissa’s confidence cracked.
“What?”
“You’re being detained on suspicion of child abuse.”
Mercer returned to the doorway.
He looked annoyed.
“We have the person we came for.”
Ruiz stared at him.
“And I have two injured children.”
Melissa pointed at Dad’s cruiser.
“He did this. He made them accuse me.”
Noah suddenly spoke.
“I recorded everything.”
Everyone looked at the camera beneath the bookshelf.
Ruiz walked toward it.
Melissa lunged first.
She tore the camera from the shelf and threw it against the wall.
It broke open.
A tiny memory card slid across the floor.
I moved toward it.
Mercer’s boot came down over the card.
“Evidence,” he said.
Ruiz narrowed her eyes.
Mercer bent down, picked it up, and placed it in his pocket.
Not an evidence bag.
His pocket.
May you like
That was when I understood something worse than Dad’s arrest.
Melissa wasn’t working alone.
