Chapter 6 - The Night Someone Came for Sophie
Cassandra was taken back into custody before the hearing ended.
For twenty-four hours, I believed that meant Sophie was safe.
Then somebody tried to take her.
It happened at 2:03 in the morning.
I woke to the sound of glass breaking downstairs.
Not a crash.
A delicate crack.
Like someone carefully cutting a window.
My eyes opened.
Sophie slept beside me.
After the nursery, she refused to sleep alone.
I reached for my phone.
No signal.
The Wi-Fi was down too.
I slid from bed.
Daniel had insisted on hiring private security after the guardianship hearing.
One guard was downstairs.
Another sat in a car outside.
I should have felt protected.
Instead, the house was silent.
Too silent.
Then I heard footsteps.
One.
Two.
Three.
Slow.
Coming upstairs.
I picked Sophie up.
She stirred.
“Mommy?”
“Shh.”
I carried her into the bathroom and locked the door.
Then immediately hated the click.
Sophie began panicking.
“Open! Open!”
I covered her ears.
“It’s okay. Mommy’s here.”
Someone tried the bedroom door.
I heard it open.
A man’s voice.
“Elena?”
Victor.
Every part of me turned cold.
He had come back.
I climbed onto the bathtub ledge and pushed open the narrow window.
Too small.
No escape.
“Come on, Elena,” Victor called. “Nobody wants Sophie hurt.”
I pressed 911.
No cellular service.
Jammed.
Victor tried the bathroom handle.
“Sophie belongs with people who can protect her future.”
I grabbed the metal towel bar.
“You come through this door, I’ll kill you.”
He laughed.
“Now you sound unstable.”
That word.
Their favorite weapon.
The thing they had used to take my child before.
Not tonight.
A loud crash came from downstairs.
Then shouting.
Victor froze.
Footsteps thundered upward.
The bathroom door shook.
“ELENA!”
Daniel.
I nearly collapsed.
Victor ran.
Daniel slammed into him in the hallway.
I heard bodies hit the wall.
Sophie screamed.
I held her tightly.
“Mommy!”
“It’s okay.”
Another crash.
Then silence.
“Daniel?”
No answer.
I opened the bathroom door.
Victor was gone.
Daniel lay against the hallway wall holding his shoulder.
Blood ran from a cut above his eyebrow.
I ran toward him.
“What happened?”
“He had a knife.”
“Are you hurt?”
“Just my shoulder.”
He looked toward Sophie.
“Is she okay?”
She stared at him.
Then something unexpected happened.
She reached for him.
“Daddy.”
Daniel’s face broke.
I handed her over.
For the first time since the nursery, Sophie allowed him to hold her.
He buried his face in her hair.
“I’m sorry.”
Police arrived minutes later.
The downstairs security guard had been drugged.
The outside guard’s tire was slashed.
Victor had planned it carefully.
But Daniel happened to be on his way over.
“Why?” I asked while paramedics wrapped his shoulder.
He looked embarrassed.
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“So you came here?”
“I sat outside sometimes.”
“What?”
“Not watching you. Watching the house.”
I stared.
“I know it sounds insane.”
“It does.”
“I was afraid Cassandra would send someone.”
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“I thought you’d tell me to leave.”
“I would have.”
“That’s why.”
Despite everything, I almost laughed.
Miller arrived.
He examined the broken window.
Then said something that erased the brief relief.
“Victor wasn’t here just for Sophie.”
“What do you mean?”
“He searched the study.”
“For what?”
Miller pointed toward the shelf where I kept Mom’s remaining documents.
Every folder had been opened.
The ruby necklace was gone.
The decoy code.
4-1-7-2.
Daniel frowned.
“He still thinks it matters.”
“Good,” Miller said.
I looked at him.
“Good?”
“If Victor believes those numbers are valuable, we may be able to use them.”
The next morning, police leaked through controlled channels that investigators had not yet determined the meaning of the code.
Twenty-three hours later, Victor made contact.
Not with me.
With Daniel.
A burner phone rang.
“Want your family left alone?” Victor asked.
Daniel looked at Miller, who was recording.
“What do you want?”
“The four numbers.”
Daniel played stupid.
“What numbers?”
Victor laughed.
“Your ex-wife has them.”
Daniel said, “You broke into her house.”
“Because your wife lost control.”
“Cassandra?”
“Don’t call her my wife.”
Victor went silent.
Daniel continued.
“You were engaged to her once.”
Another silence.
“Who told you?”
“My father.”
A lie.
Victor’s breathing changed.
“Your father should have minded his own business.”
There.
Miller wrote something down.
Daniel asked, “Did you kill him?”
I stopped breathing.
Victor laughed again.
“Heart attacks happen.”
Daniel’s face went white.
Miller gestured to continue.
“And Evelyn?”
Victor said nothing.
Daniel whispered, “Did Cassandra kill Elena’s mother?”
“Cassandra never had the stomach.”
My knees nearly gave out.
Miller’s eyes sharpened.
“Then who did?”
Victor answered with four words.
“You’re asking the wrong question.”
The call ended.
But it was enough.
Police reopened both deaths.
Charles Whitmore.
Evelyn Hart.
Two people who had tried to protect Sophie.
Two people who died months apart.
Miller ordered toxicology records pulled.
Charles had been cremated.
No new testing possible.
My mother had been buried.
Exhumation required court approval.
I hated the idea.
But if someone killed her, I needed to know.
Three days later, approval came.
The results took longer.
While we waited, Daniel moved into a hotel two blocks from my apartment.
He never entered without permission.
He attended parenting therapy.
He signed over temporary sole custody to me.
He told the court he would accept supervised visits if that made Sophie feel safe.
For once, he was no longer fighting to win.
He was trying to repair.
Then Miller called.
“Elena.”
I knew from his voice.
“What did they find?”
“A medication in Evelyn’s system.”
“She took medication.”
“Not this one.”
My hand tightened.
“What?”
“Digitalis.”
I knew the word.
A heart medication.
Dangerous in excess.
Mom had died of what doctors called a sudden cardiac arrhythmia.
Miller continued.
“The concentration was inconsistent with therapeutic use.”
I sat down.
“Someone poisoned her.”
“We can’t say exactly how yet.”
I closed my eyes.
Mom.
Her kitchen.
Her warnings.
The rabbit.
The necklace.
She had known she was in danger.
And still she fought for Sophie.
Miller said, “There’s something else.”
“What?”
“The same drug was found listed on a purchase invoice connected to a medical account.”
“Whose?”
A pause.
“Cassandra’s sister.”
I had almost forgotten she existed.
Marianne Blake.
The woman who posted Cassandra’s bail.
A pharmacist.
Suddenly the conspiracy was no longer one woman and one missing security consultant.
It was a family.
And somewhere, Victor was still waiting for four numbers that meant nothing.
May you like
So Officer Miller suggested we give them to him.
And see who came to collect.
