Chapter 1 - The Hand Over Lily’s Mouth
Ethan Walker heard his daughter’s muffled crying before he reached the bedroom.
He shoved the door open.
His mother was on the floor beside eight-month-old Lily.
One hand was clamped over the baby’s mouth.
“Marlene!”
She jerked around.
Ethan crossed the room in two strides, pulled his mother away, and dropped immediately beside Lily.
His daughter gasped and screamed.
That scream was the best sound Ethan had ever heard.
He lifted her against his chest.
“What the hell were you doing?”
Marlene straightened her cream blouse.
“She wouldn’t stop crying.”
“So you covered her mouth?”
“I was trying to calm her down.”
“You were threatening her.”
“She’s eight months old, Ethan. She doesn’t understand words.”
That answer made him colder.
Because she hadn’t denied saying them.
On the chair beside her sat the black leather handbag Marlene carried everywhere.
Lily saw it and began crying harder.
Not because she understood what was inside.
Because Marlene lunged for it.
Fast.
Too fast.
Ethan got there first.
“Give me my bag.”
“No.”
“Ethan.”
He opened it.
The first thing he saw was a phone.
Not Marlene’s.
Rachel’s.
His wife’s phone had supposedly disappeared three nights earlier when she walked out after the worst argument of their marriage.
Ethan stared at it.
Then he saw Rachel’s house keys.
Her wallet.
Her work badge.
And a small spiral notebook Ethan had watched Rachel search for before she left.
Marlene’s face lost all color.
Ethan looked at her.
“Why do you have Rachel’s things?”
“She asked me to hold them.”
“No, she didn’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I watched her tear the kitchen apart looking for this phone.”
Marlene stepped toward him.
“Give me the bag.”
Ethan moved backward.
Lily clung to his shirt.
Three nights earlier, Rachel had left their Myers Park home after telling Ethan she couldn’t live with his mother controlling every decision they made.
Marlene had stood beside him afterward and said Rachel needed time to “come to her senses.”
Ethan had believed her.
Worse, he had let her stay.
He looked down at Rachel’s phone.
There were seventeen missed calls on the lock screen.
Eleven from him.
Three from Rachel’s sister.
Two from Rachel’s office.
One from a Charlotte number he didn’t recognize.
Then a notification appeared.
A new voicemail.
From Rachel.
Ethan looked up slowly.
Marlene whispered, “Don’t.”
May you like
That single word changed everything.
He pressed play.
