Chapter 9 - They Found Us
Mom.
I killed the lights.
Megan grabbed Noah.
“How did they find us?”
“I don’t know.”
Mom knocked again.
“Daniel!”
Rachel shouted from outside.
“We know you’re in there.”
I called 911.
Then Ryan.
“Police are coming,” he said.
“They found the cabin.”
“How?”
“I never told anyone you owned it.”
“Neither did I.”
My brain raced.
Credit card?
Phone location?
Car?
Then I remembered Mom had been inside our house while we packed.
“Tracker.”
“What?” Megan whispered.
I grabbed our bags.
Dumped them onto the floor.
Clothes.
Diapers.
Medication.
Nothing.
Then Noah walked toward my backpack.
He hit it with the controller.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
Megan and I looked at each other.
“No way.”
I opened the side pocket.
Inside was a tiny black device.
An AirTag-style tracker.
My stomach dropped.
Megan whispered, “She tracked us.”
Mom’s voice came through the door.
“You can’t hide forever!”
I photographed the tracker without touching it further.
Then sirens sounded.
Rachel cursed outside.
Doors slammed.
A vehicle accelerated down the driveway.
Mom stayed.
By the time deputies arrived, she was standing on the porch crying.
“My son is being manipulated.”
That was her opening statement.
A deputy separated us.
Mom insisted she had come because she feared for Noah’s safety.
“How did you know where we were?”
“A family friend told me.”
“Who?”
“I don’t want to involve them.”
The deputy showed her the tracker.
Mom stopped crying.
“I’ve never seen that.”
The deputy bagged it.
Her performance changed immediately.
“This is insane. Daniel must have planted it.”
That sentence did something to me.
All my life, I had thought Mom lied only when she believed she was protecting us.
Suddenly I saw the truth.
She lied whenever truth stopped serving her.
The deputies escorted her away from the property.
Rachel had already fled.
We stayed elsewhere that night.
A hotel under Ryan’s name.
Rebecca filed emergency protective-order petitions first thing the next morning.
By afternoon, temporary restrictions were issued.
No contact with Megan.
No contact with Noah.
No coming within a specified distance of our residence.
I expected Mom to explode.
Instead, she went silent.
Too silent.
Three days passed.
We returned home after security upgrades.
New cameras.
New alarms.
New locks.
I took leave from work.
And I did something I should have done long ago.
I turned off the game console.
Not forever.
Just long enough to understand what had happened in my own home while I stared at another screen.
On the fourth evening, Megan found me washing dishes.
She leaned against the doorway.
“Noah trained you.”
I smiled.
“He’s terrifying.”
For the first time in days, she laughed.
Then Noah toddled into the kitchen carrying my controller.
He placed it on the counter.
“No.”
I stared at him.
Megan laughed harder.
“Apparently you’re not allowed.”
I picked him up.
“You’re running this house now?”
He pointed at Megan.
“Mommy.”
My smile faded.
Because Megan had stopped laughing.
She was staring through the kitchen window.
“What?”
She pointed.
Across the street sat a white sedan.
A man inside held a camera.
The second I stepped toward the window, he drove away.
Two minutes later, Megan’s phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
One photograph.
Us through the kitchen window.
May you like
Underneath were six words:
COURT WILL LOVE THIS LITTLE FAMILY.
