Chapter 8 - THE FIRE
Daniel survived.
Barely.
The fire started in his detached garage and spread toward the kitchen.
A smoke detector woke him before the flames reached the hallway.
The hard drive containing his security footage was missing.
Not burned.
Missing.
But Ethan and Margaret made one enormous mistake.
Daniel had uploaded everything to cloud storage.
At 4:40 p.m., Detective Ramirez showed me another recording.
It was from a side camera Daniel hadn’t mentioned.
The footage showed a dark SUV stopping near his house twenty-three minutes before the fire.
A man got out.
Baseball cap.
Hooded sweatshirt.
Gloves.
His face was never visible.
But his limp was.
Ethan’s younger brother, Lucas, had limped since a motorcycle accident at nineteen.
I knew that walk.
So did Ethan.
“Lucas,” I whispered.
Ramirez didn’t confirm it.
But she didn’t need to.
Police found him that evening at a motel near Providence.
He had $22,000 in cash.
Daniel’s hard drive was inside his car.
Lucas lasted three hours in interrogation.
Then he started talking.
Not because he cared about me.
Because he cared about himself.
Ethan had paid him to steal the hard drive.
Margaret had told him to “make the place look accidental.”
Lucas insisted he didn’t intend to hurt Daniel.
Ramirez later told me that sentence appeared often in police interviews.
People had remarkable ways of separating their intentions from the predictable consequences of their actions.
Lucas also gave them something bigger.
A group chat.
He had screenshots.
Ethan.
Margaret.
Lucas.
Messages going back months.
At 9:15 p.m., Ramirez entered my hospital room carrying printed pages.
“You should prepare yourself.”
I almost told her there was nothing left Ethan could do that would surprise me.
I was wrong.
One message from Ethan read:
The baby needs to survive. Claire just needs to be unable to manage the trust.
Margaret replied:
A fall can create complications without looking deliberate.
Lucas:
You two are insane.
Ethan:
Nobody is asking you to do anything.
Margaret:
Yet.
I stopped reading.
My daughter kicked hard beneath my ribs.
Alive.
Strong.
My hands shook.
“He wanted the baby.”
Ramirez said nothing.
“He wanted Sophie alive.”
“Yes.”
“And me?”
Her silence answered.
Then another pain tightened across my abdomen.
Different from before.
Deep.
Sharp.
I gasped.
The fetal monitor changed.
A nurse rushed in.
Then another.
My doctor came running.
“Claire, we’re going to the operating room.”
“What’s happening?”
“The baby’s heart rate is dropping.”
“No.”
“We need to deliver now.”
They pushed my bed toward the door.
The ceiling lights raced above me.
I grabbed Rebecca’s hand.
“Don’t let Ethan near her.”
“I won’t.”
“Promise me.”
“I promise.”
As the elevator doors closed, I heard Detective Ramirez’s phone ring.
Then her voice.
May you like
“Ethan’s gone.”
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