Chapter 4 - The Man in the Baseball Cap
Harper denied it.
Then Ortiz showed her the enhanced image.
The baseball cap had hidden most of the man's face, but not enough.
Harper stared at him.
“Victor.”
Victor Hale.
Rachel's former boyfriend.
The man Harper believed Rachel had escaped sixteen years earlier.
Alive.
Older.
And walking away from my daughter's house.
But Rachel had been beside him.
That made no sense.
Unless Rachel had never really escaped Victor.
Or unless she had returned to him.
Violet's statement made Ethan something other than a suspect.
Potential witness.
Potential victim.
Police issued a missing-person alert.
By noon, they found Ethan's car near an abandoned warehouse twelve miles outside town.
Empty.
His phone lay smashed beneath the driver's seat.
But his blood wasn't in the vehicle.
That gave us hope.
Then Ortiz received another break.
Violet's backpack contained a hidden flash drive sewn behind the inner lining.
My daughter had hidden it herself.
On it were photographs of the documents from Rachel's old box.
Bank accounts.
Names.
Dates.
Addresses.
Some were nearly twenty years old.
Others were recent.
Victor Hale hadn't stopped.
He had expanded.
His crew targeted families, learned their routines, compromised security systems, entered homes, and used personal information to blackmail victims afterward.
Rachel's name appeared repeatedly.
Sometimes as an account holder.
Sometimes as a witness.
Sometimes as a payment recipient.
Then Ortiz found a folder Violet had labeled:
IF SOMETHING HAPPENS TO ME.
Inside was a video.
Violet appeared on screen.
Healthy.
Nervous.
Alive.
“If you're watching this, I was right about something.”
I couldn't breathe.
She continued.
“Dad, please don't do anything stupid.”
Ortiz looked at me.
Even through a recording, my daughter knew me.
Violet explained that Ethan had helped her investigate Victor after Rachel began contacting her.
Ethan's older brother had once worked for Victor.
He disappeared three years earlier.
Police called it voluntary disappearance.
Ethan never believed it.
Then Violet said something none of us expected.
“Mom isn't helping Victor.”
Harper started crying.
“She is afraid of him.”
Violet looked directly into the camera.
“And Aunt Rachel isn't working with Victor either.”
Ortiz paused the video.
“Then why was Rachel leaving the house with him?”
I knew the answer before Violet said it.
“She's undercover.”
Rachel had spent sixteen years inside Victor Hale's organization.
Not because she loved him.
Because she was trying to destroy him.
And Violet had accidentally become part of her plan.
The video ended with a warning.
“Victor has someone inside the police department.”
Detective Ortiz went still.
Then her phone rang.
She answered.
Her expression changed.
“What?”
She listened.
“When?”
She hung up.
Reed asked, “What happened?”
Ortiz looked at us.
“The evidence room was breached.”
“The flash drive?”
“No. We still have that.”
“What was taken?”
She looked directly at me.
“The original doorbell-camera footage.”
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Someone wasn't just watching the investigation.
Someone was inside it.
