Chapter 13 - The Break-In
The clinic locked its doors after the theft.
Patients were moved to secure rooms. Staff members checked badges. Security officers searched trash bins, stairwells, and the parking garage.
Mara stood beside Leni’s bed, listening to the storm scrape against the windows.
“Someone took Dad’s video,” Leni said.
“We still have a copy.”
“They took the records.”
“The police have duplicates.”
“What if they take me?”
Mara sat beside her. “No one is taking you.”
This time, she did not say it because children needed certainty. She said it because she had made a plan.
Jules had arranged a temporary protection order. Leni would stay in a supervised medical residence until a judge reviewed the case. Mara would sleep in the room next door. Detective Bell would assign an officer to the entrance.
It was not home, but it was safe.
Cal arrived with a lawyer and a bruised cheek.
“Who hit you?” Mara asked.
“I fell.”
“You are a terrible liar.”
He looked toward Leni. “I found something.”
He handed Mara a torn piece of paper recovered from the shelter’s copier room.
It contained a list of names. June’s. Grant’s. And the name of a BrightPath employee: Nessa Cole.
“She was Grant’s assistant,” Cal said. “She handled the portal.”
“Where is she?”
“Grant says he fired her. Nessa says she quit.”
Bell entered. “Nessa Cole is missing.”
Mara felt the story shifting again. “Could she have taken the records?”
“She had access.”
“Could she be the one sending threats?”
“Possibly.”
Leni looked at the torn paper. “I know her.”
Mara crouched. “From where?”
“She came to Grandma’s house.”
“When?”
“On the day Grandma made me stand in the pantry.”
Cal closed his eyes.
“What did Nessa do?” Bell asked.
“She gave Grandma an envelope. Grandma said I was not supposed to hear.”
“Did Nessa see you?”
“She saw me when Grandma opened the pantry.”
“What did she say?”
Leni’s voice became faint. “She said, ‘The girl knows.’”
Bell wrote it down.
Mara remembered the trash on the bed: the cereal bowl, the magazine, the orange peels. Beneath the pile, she had found a tiny black button.
She took it from her pocket.
“This was on the bed.”
Cal recognized it. “That’s from Nessa’s coat.”
“How do you know?”
“She wore one with silver buttons.”
Bell reached for the evidence bag.
At that moment, the intercom crackled.
The nurse’s voice came through, distorted by static.
“Mara Vale, please report to the front desk. Your daughter’s discharge has been authorized.”
Mara froze.
“I did not authorize discharge,” she said.
The intercom crackled again.
“Your daughter is being transferred now.”
Leni grabbed Mara’s sleeve.
“Mom, don’t let them take me.”
May you like
The hallway door opened.
And a woman wearing a nurse’s uniform stepped inside.
