Chapter 4: What Daniel Knew
The dots never turned into a message.
I showed Marsh the text.
He read it twice without speaking, then took out his own phone and made a call.
"I need a trace on this number.
Priority." He read it out, then looked at me.
"Don't respond again.
Not yet."
"He said don't call the police."
"I know what he said." Marsh held my gaze.
"Your daughter has been taken from school grounds by a man connected to the woman who planted a surveillance camera in her bedroom.
Right now, the most dangerous thing you can do is follow instructions from someone you don't trust."
I knew he was right.
I put the phone in my pocket.
They set up a command post in the school's main office.
I sat in a chair against the wall and watched officers move in and out.
Someone put a coffee in my hands.
I didn't drink it.
Forty minutes later, my phone rang.
Daniel.
Marsh was beside me in two steps.
He held up one finger: *keep him talking.* He pressed record on his own device.
I answered.
"Where is she?" I said.
"She's fine.
She's eating a sandwich right now, she's completely fine." Daniel's voice was tight, controlled.
"I need you to listen to me before you do something you can't undo."
"You took my daughter out of school, Daniel."
"I took her away from Vanessa.
There's a difference." A pause.
"Has Marsh told you what's on the rest of that memory card?
Not the clips of Emma.
The other files."
I looked at Marsh.
He gave nothing away.
"Tell me," I said.
"There's a folder.
Encrypted.
Marsh's team would have found it by now." Daniel's voice dropped.
"It has my daughter in it, Nathan.
Lily.
Forty-one clips over nine months.
Vanessa had a camera in Lily's room too.
Before yours.
Before she ever met you."
The coffee cup cracked in my grip.
"You have a daughter," I said.
"Lily is five.
Vanessa and I ended two years ago.
I thought it was over.
I thought she was gone." His breath came unsteady.
"Three weeks ago Lily told me something.
Something about a woman who came to the house when her mother was at work.
A woman who brought her stuffed animals."
My stomach dropped.
"The stuffed animals on the shelf.
In the clips."
"Vanessa put them there.
She put the cameras inside them.
She's been doing this for at least two years, Nathan.
Maybe longer." He stopped.
"I didn't know how to come to you.
I didn't know if you'd believe me.
So I waited and I watched and then this morning Emma's school called the wrong parent — they had an old emergency contact on file.
My number.
From when you listed me two years ago."
I remembered.
Emma's first week at that school.
Daniel had been the only family I had.
"So they called you," I said.
"They called me.
And I looked out my window and Vanessa's car was parked on my street." His voice broke, just slightly.
"I drove straight there.
I got Emma out of that playground before Vanessa reached the fence.
I was maybe three minutes ahead of her."
The room felt very still.
"Where are you now?" I asked.
A pause.
"Do you believe me?"
I looked at Marsh.
He was already typing something on his tablet.
He turned it to face me: *Lily Calloway.
Mother: Rachel Hines.
Father: Daniel Calloway.
DOB consistent.*
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"I believe you," I said.
"Tell me where you are."
