Chapter 7: The Notebook Under the Bed
The blue box was a shoebox, actually.
Covered in blue wrapping paper, the kind with small gold stars, the kind you'd use for a birthday gift.
Megan's sister, Ruth, had kept it under her bed for eight months without opening it.
Megan had brought it over on a Tuesday afternoon in March, told Ruth it was important documents, and asked her to keep it safe without asking questions.
Ruth had not asked questions.
She testified to this on the second day of the preliminary hearing, sitting very straight in the witness chair, her hands folded in her lap.
"Did your sister tell you what was in the box?" Voss asked.
"No.
She said she'd explain later." Ruth paused.
"She said if anything ever happened to her, I should give it to the police without opening it first."
"And did anything seem unusual to you about that request?"
Ruth looked at her hands.
"I thought she was being dramatic.
I thought it was — I thought maybe they were having problems and she was being cautious." She looked up.
"I didn't think she meant this."
"What did you do when you learned your sister had been locked in that basement?"
"I went straight home and got the box."
"Did you open it?"
"No." A pause.
"I was afraid of what was inside."
The box contained: a spiral notebook, forty-three pages of handwritten notes in Megan's careful, even handwriting.
Dates, times, observations.
A section labeled *things he said* and another labeled *things that don't add up*.
Printed screenshots of text conversations, folded in thirds.
A hand-drawn map of the Denton County property with dimensions and a circled area in the northeast corner.
And a single photograph, printed on regular paper, of a woman standing in front of a blue car.
Carol Foss.
Taken from a social media profile that no longer existed.
Megan had written one line beneath it.
*She deserves to be found.*
Voss read that line aloud in the courtroom.
My lawyer objected.
The judge sustained it, instructed the jury to disregard.
But the line had already been spoken in that room.
It had already landed.
I watched two jurors.
An older woman in the third seat who had been taking notes throughout the hearing.
A man in the back row who had been largely expressionless until that moment.
The older woman stopped writing.
The man in the back row looked at me.
I looked away first.
After the hearing, in the corridor outside, I was being walked back toward the holding area when I heard a voice behind me.
"Daniel."
I turned.
It was Ruth.
She was standing near the wall, her coat still on, her bag over her shoulder.
The victim's advocate was a few feet away, giving her space.
Callum — now in plain clothes, present as a witness — moved slightly between us.
Not blocking.
Just present.
Ruth looked at me for a long moment.
"She talked about you every week," she said.
"For two years, she defended you.
Every time I said something was off, she defended you." Her voice was steady.
Quiet.
The kind of quiet that had been prepared in advance.
"I want you to know that.
I want you to know what you did to someone who loved you."
She didn't wait for an answer.
She turned and walked down the corridor toward the exit, and the victim's advocate fell into step beside her, and they pushed through the door together into the grey afternoon light.
Callum touched my elbow.
"Let's go."
I went.
But I kept seeing Ruth's face.
The steadiness of it.
The way she'd said *someone who loved you* like it was a fact she was entering into the record.
May you like
Like she wanted it documented.
Like she needed me to carry it.
