Chapter 38: The Interrogation

The officer left to deal with the paramedics, his radio crackling with static. The front door clicked shut, locking us back into the silence of the house.

Mark stood in the center of the foyer, staring at his hands. He looked like a man who had just walked away from a car crash, dazed and disconnected from the wreckage.

"Go wash up," Chloe said, her voice soft but commanding. She didn't look at him. She was looking at me.

Mark nodded, a jerky, mechanical motion. He walked toward the kitchen sink, moving like a sleepwalker.

"You killed her," I whispered. The words felt foreign in my mouth, heavy and jagged. "You actually killed her."

"It was an accident," Chloe said smoothly. She walked over to me, her heels clicking on the hardwood. "Just like Sarah."

She reached out and tucked a stray hair behind my ear. Her fingers were cold.

"Accidents happen, Elara. Especially to people who ask too many questions."

I flinched away from her touch. "You're a monster."

"I'm a survivor," she corrected. "Elena Rostova was a victim. She was weak. She let people walk all over her. But Chloe? Chloe survives."

She leaned in close, her eyes searching mine.

"And you, Elara? Are you a survivor? Or just a victim?"

"I'm a mother," I said, my voice shaking. "And I'm going to get my daughter back."

Chloe laughed. It was a dry, brittle sound.

"You don't even have a daughter anymore," she said. "According to the state, Lily Vance doesn't exist yet. And according to the cremation order, neither do you."

She straightened up, smoothing the front of her blazer.

"Go upstairs, Elara. Take a shower. Change your sheets. You look like a mess."

"I'm not going anywhere."

"Yes, you are," she said. Her voice dropped, losing the veneer of politeness. "Because if you don't, I'm going to go into that guest room and have a little chat with Nadia. And I don't think you want to know what Nadia does when she's bored."

The threat was clear. Physical, immediate violence against my baby.

I looked at Mark, washing his hands in the kitchen. He was scrubbing them raw, the water running red with... dirt? Or maybe it was just my imagination.

He wouldn't help me. Not now. He was too far gone.

I turned and walked up the stairs. My legs felt like lead. Every step was a battle against the gravity of my own despair.

I reached the bedroom. The door was still open from when Mark had broken in. The lock was shattered.

I walked inside. The room smelled of stale air and fear. The vent cover lay on the floor, twisted and useless. The window was still screwed shut.

I walked to the bed and stripped the sheets. I didn't do it because she told me to. I did it because I needed to do something. Anything.

I bundled the linen into a ball and threw it into the corner.

Then I saw it.

Under the mattress, tucked into the frame of the bed.

A small, black rectangle.

It wasn't a bug. It wasn't a camera.

It was a phone.

Not the burner Brenda gave me. Not my own phone.

It was an old iPhone. Cracked screen. Pink case.

I picked it up. It was dead, of course. But it wasn't Mark's. And it wasn't mine.

I turned it over. On the back, stuck to the case with a peeling sticker, was a name.

*Sarah.*