Chapter 2 - The House of Echoes
The sirens outside painted the living room in pulsing bars of red and blue. I sat frozen on the rug, the pastel pink jar of Snow Angel Glow Cream resting open beside my knees. The air still smelled faintly of pine and peppermint, but underneath lingered a sharp, chemical tang—something bitter and acrid that clung to the back of my throat.
Officer Vance, a stocky man with weary eyes and a notebook already half-filled, knelt beside the coffee table. He didn't touch the plastic bottle of industrial drain cleaner with his bare hands; instead, he used a transparent evidence bag like a glove, lifting it just enough to inspect the label.
“When did you last see him, Mrs. Pierce?” Officer Vance asked, his voice low and steady.
“When we left for the hospital,” I answered, my voice shaking. My hands were still cold, stained with the phantom ghost of panic. “Emma was screaming. Daniel carried her out to the car. I turned around to grab her coat, and Richard was... he was just standing there. He didn't say a word. When we came back, he was gone.”
Daniel walked in from the hallway, his face pale, rubbing his palms together as if he could wash away the events of the last three hours. “The doctors said it was a severe chemical burn, but thankfully she didn't ingest any of it, and her eyes were spared because she squeezed them shut just in time. They're keeping her overnight for observation. Her skin... God, her face is blistered, Clara.”
He looked at the officers, his voice breaking. “My father did this. My own father put industrial lye into a little girl's cosmetic jar.”
Officer Miller, the second officer, stepped away from the kitchen doorway. “We checked the perimeter. His car is gone from the driveway, but his winter coat is still hanging in the hall closet. He didn't drive far, or he had someone pick him up.”
“He doesn't have anyone,” Daniel whispered, shaking his head. “Mom died five years ago. He alienated all his friends from the lodge. It’s just us... or at least, it was.”
I stood up, my knees trembling. “It wasn't an accident, Daniel. Look at the jar. Look at the way it was sealed. He didn't just buy a skin cream and spill something into it. The consistency has been altered. He manufactured this.”
Officer Vance flipped a page in his notebook. “We’re going to need that gift box, the receipt if you have it, and anything else Richard gave her recently. More importantly, we need to know if there are other locations he frequent. A cabin? A workshop?”
“There’s the old hunting lodge upstate,” Daniel said instantly. “Near Blackwood Ridge. He spent every weekend there after my mother passed. No electricity, bad cell service. If he’s running, that’s where he’ll go.”
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Vance nodded to Miller. “Call dispatch. Put out a BOLO for Richard Pierce and his vehicle. Notify the state troopers near Blackwood Ridge. We’re going to need a warrant, but given the circumstances of an active chemical assault on a minor, we can move fast.”
As the officers moved toward the door to coordinate with backup, I looked down at the jar again. Engraved on the bottom was a small serial number. Richard hadn't just bought this off a shelf. He had prepared for this moment weeks, maybe months, in advance.
