Chapter 4 - THE MESSAGE REBECCA RECEIVED
My message had reached Rebecca.
It arrived at 2:13 on a Tuesday morning, broken into pieces because the signal disappeared during transmission. The location pin showed only our street. The audio lasted eleven seconds.
Marcus’s voice said:
Once the baby comes, the property follows the child. She only has to stay quiet until then.
Then metal rattled.
Rebecca called my number.
Marcus answered through a text, claiming I was asleep at the treatment center.
Rebecca did not confront him.
Her husband, Evan Shaw, was a county detective assigned to financial crimes. He listened to the audio and noticed something Rebecca initially missed: beneath Marcus’s voice was the steady mechanical hum of the old basement dehumidifier.
Evan had heard it years earlier while helping us repair a burst pipe.
The treatment-center story made no sense.
Rebecca and Evan contacted the sheriff’s office, my obstetrician, and the private facility Marcus claimed had admitted me. The facility had no patient under my name.
My doctor had not authorized residential treatment.
The final prenatal appointments had been canceled through an online account accessed from Marcus’s home computer.
Investigators wanted to move quickly, but they needed to know whether I was still inside the house and whether Marcus had accomplices or weapons.
Then Marcus invited Rebecca and Evan to dinner.
He believed refusing contact would look suspicious. He also wanted them to repeat the treatment story to extended family after seeing how calm he appeared.
Rebecca accepted.
She spent the afternoon pretending she believed every lie.
Before entering the house, Evan activated a department recording device beneath his green jacket. Deputies waited nearby while he and Rebecca joined Marcus, Lorraine, and several business associates at the dining table.
Marcus poured wine.
Lorraine said I was “finally receiving the help I needed.”
Then Evan heard a metal impact beneath the floor.
A few minutes later, he heard a man’s voice through the basement vent.
May you like
“You’re not leaving this basement.”
That gave them the emergency they no longer had to infer.
