Chapter 5 - SOMEONE WAS STILL INSIDE
Ethan tore the device out of the mobile.
The green light died.
Then a floorboard creaked downstairs.
Claire grabbed his arm.
“Ethan.”
He motioned for silence.
Thomas moved toward the hallway.
“Stay here.”
“No,” Ethan said. “You stay with Claire.”
Another sound.
A dull knock from below.
Ethan picked up the baseball bat beside the bedroom closet and walked downstairs.
“Police!” Thomas shouted.
Ethan glared back.
“What the hell are you doing?”
“If someone’s down there, I want them to think we called them.”
The house went silent.
Ethan reached the kitchen.
Empty.
Living room.
Empty.
Then he saw the basement door.
Open.
It had been closed when they arrived.
He tightened his grip on the bat.
“Call 911,” he whispered.
Thomas dialed.
Ethan descended.
One step.
Two.
The basement smelled like laundry detergent and damp concrete.
“Anybody down here?”
Nothing.
He reached the bottom.
Then something moved behind the furnace.
Ethan raised the bat.
“Come out!”
A gray shape shot past him.
Claire screamed upstairs.
Ethan spun.
A cat raced up the stairs and disappeared.
Thomas leaned against the wall.
“Jesus.”
Ethan lowered the bat.
Then he noticed the plastic storage bin.
It was open.
Inside were clothes.
Claire’s clothes.
A toothbrush.
Running shoes.
A framed picture of Claire and Lily.
And a handwritten note.
Ethan unfolded it.
I’m sorry.
I can’t be a mother.
Please don’t look for me.
His hands started shaking.
Claire walked down behind him.
“What is that?”
Ethan tried to hide it.
Too late.
She grabbed it.
Read it.
“No.”
Thomas frowned.
“That’s your handwriting?”
“It looks like mine.”
Claire stared at the page.
“But I didn’t write this.”
Beneath the note sat a prescription bottle.
Empty.
The label had Claire’s name on it.
She looked horrified.
“I lost that bottle.”
“When?” Ethan asked.
“Two weeks ago.”
She looked at him.
“Your mom told me I must have thrown it away.”
Thomas muttered, “She was building something.”
Claire wrapped both arms around herself.
“A suicide.”
No one spoke.
Ethan looked at the staged bag.
The forged letter.
The missing medication.
Then he understood.
“If you had disappeared…”
Claire finished for him.
“Everyone would think I left voluntarily.”
Thomas shook his head.
“Or worse.”
Ethan called Officer Ramirez.
When the police arrived, they sealed the basement.
Two detectives photographed everything.
Then one of them emerged holding a sealed evidence bag.
“What’s that?” Ethan asked.
“Another phone.”
“Whose?”
“We don’t know yet.”
The detective tapped the screen through the plastic.
“There are several unsent drafts.”
“Drafts of what?”
“Text messages.”
“To who?”
The detective looked at Claire.
“To your husband.”
Claire’s stomach dropped.
“What do they say?”
He hesitated.
Then read one.
“I’m sorry, Ethan. Lily deserves better than me.”
Claire began crying.
Ethan held her.
The detective scrolled.
“There’s also a scheduled message.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow morning.”
“What does it say?”
The detective looked up.
“By the time you read this, I’ll be gone.”
A cold silence filled the basement.
Then the phone vibrated inside the evidence bag.
Everyone stared.
A new message had arrived.
From a number saved under one name.
MOM.
And the message contained only four words.
May you like
DID SHE FIND IT YET?
---
