Chapter 6
The nurse’s smile was too perfect.
Too calm.
Too much like Vivian’s.
I stood at once.
“She doesn’t have medicine right now.”
The nurse looked at me like I was a stain on the floor.
“Doctor’s order.”
“Which doctor?”
She moved closer to Emily’s bed.
Emily shrank behind me.
The officer outside our door was arguing with someone down the hall.
The alarm still screamed.
The nurse held a syringe in her right hand.
My blood went cold.
“Stop,” I said.
She lunged.
I grabbed the tray table and shoved it into her knees.
She stumbled.
The syringe flew from her hand and skidded under the bed.
Emily screamed.
I slammed the call button again and again.
The nurse clawed at my face.
I grabbed her wrist.
She was stronger than me.
Much stronger.
She drove me backward into the wall.
Pain flashed through my shoulder.
“Move,” she hissed.
Not a nurse.
Not even close.
Emily threw her cup of water at the woman’s face.
The woman cursed.
The officer finally burst in.
The fake nurse tried to run.
He tackled her before she reached the door.
Detective Kent arrived three minutes later.
Her face went pale when she saw the syringe bagged by hospital security.
“What was in it?” I asked.
“We’ll test it.”
But I already knew.
Something to silence Emily.
Maybe forever.
Arthur woke from a sedative when he heard the commotion.
He saw the fake nurse in cuffs and began to weep with rage.
“She sent someone into a hospital.”
Detective Kent’s jaw tightened.
“She’s getting desperate.”
Emily sat on the bed with both knees pulled up.
“She knows I remembered.”
Everyone turned.
I sat beside her carefully.
“What did you remember?”
Emily looked at Arthur.
“I thought it was a bad dream.”
Arthur took her hand.
“You can tell us anything.”
Her voice was tiny.
“Daddy came home yelling. Mommy was crying. Aunt Vivian said he should have stayed out of her business. Daddy said he found the children. He said he was going to Grandpa.”
Arthur covered his mouth.
Emily stared at the blanket.
“Then the guard hurt Daddy. Mommy screamed. Aunt Vivian told me to hide, so I went behind the painting because we played there once. But then she found me. She said I saw too much.”
My eyes burned.
“She tied your hands?”
Emily nodded.
“She put me in the wall. I heard Daddy downstairs later. He was crying. Mommy was yelling his name.”
Arthur shook his head.
“No. No.”
Emily’s lips trembled.
“Then no more.”
The room broke around her.
Arthur bent over her hand.
Detective Kent turned away for a moment.
Even the officer at the door wiped his eyes.
But Emily was not done.
“She took Daddy’s watch. She said dead men don’t need time.”
Arthur made a broken sound.
Detective Kent crouched.
“Emily, do you know where she put it?”
Emily nodded slowly.
“In the music room. Inside the piano bench. There’s a secret place.”
Detective Kent stood.
“I’m going now.”
“I’m coming,” Arthur said.
“You need rest.”
“I need my son.”
His voice ended the argument.
I stayed with Emily while Arthur and Detective Kent returned to the mansion under heavy guard.
The hospital moved us to another room.
New officers.
New nurses.
Every badge checked twice.
Still, I trusted no one.
Emily leaned against me and whispered, “Do you think I’m bad?”
The question stabbed me.
“No.”
“She said bad girls make families die.”
I closed my eyes.
“Vivian said that because she wanted you too scared to tell the truth.”
“What if I told sooner?”
“You were a little girl.”
“I’m still little.”
“Yes,” I said, my voice breaking. “You are. And adults were supposed to protect you.”
She thought about that.
“Like you?”
I looked at her.
“I’m trying.”
She slipped her hand into mine.
“You’re doing it.”
I had no answer.
I just held her hand.
Near midnight, Detective Kent returned.
Arthur came behind her.
He was holding something wrapped in cloth.
His face looked destroyed and alive at the same time.
They had found the watch.
Inside the watch backing was a storage unit key.
Inside the piano bench was also a memory card.
Daniel had hidden it before he was killed.
Arthur placed the watch on Emily’s blanket.
The back was engraved.
For Daniel, who made time matter. Love, Dad.
Arthur’s tears fell onto the blanket.
Emily touched the watch with one finger.
“Daddy wore it every day.”
Detective Kent plugged the memory card into a secure laptop.
The video opened.
Daniel appeared in the mansion basement.
His face was bruised.
His hands were tied.
Clara was beside him, crying but alive.
Vivian stood in front of them.
You could only see her back, but her voice was clear.
“You should have let me manage the foundation.”
Daniel spat blood.
“You sell children.”
Vivian slapped him.
Clara shouted, “Arthur will find out.”
Vivian laughed.
“My father believes what I tell him.”
Daniel looked toward the camera.
He knew it was there.
He spoke slowly.
“Dad, if you see this, Emily is alive. Vivian has her. Do not believe the lake story.”
Vivian turned.
The video shook.
Then it went black.
Arthur collapsed into a chair.
No one spoke.
There it was.
The truth.
Ugly.
Clear.
Unforgivable.
Detective Kent’s phone rang.
She answered.
Her face changed.
“They found the storage unit.”
She listened longer.
Then her eyes moved to Emily.
“What is it?” I asked.
She lowered the phone.
“The unit has records of private placements, payments, and travel documents. Vivian has been moving children for years.”
Arthur whispered, “How many?”
Detective Kent’s voice was grim.
“Enough that federal agents are taking over.”
Emily looked at me.
“Other kids were in walls?”
I pulled her close.
“No, sweetheart. But they were hidden in other ways.”
She began to cry.
Quietly.
Like she had cried alone too many times.
I held her until she slept.
At dawn, the news changed.
Vivian Blackwood was no longer a misunderstood philanthropist.
She was a fugitive.
Her face appeared on every screen.
Her foundation offices were raided.
Her bank accounts were frozen.
Her friends stopped defending her.
But Vivian still had one move left.
At seven in the morning, Arthur’s lawyer rushed into the hospital room, pale and breathless.
“Vivian filed a custody claim before she disappeared.”
Arthur stared at him.
“She what?”
The lawyer swallowed.
“She named Grace as the abductor.”
My blood went cold.
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“And she filed documents claiming Emily is legally her adopted daughter.”
Emily woke to the sound of her own nightmare returning.
