Chapter 16 - Scout's Warning

Police arrived before Ben did.

It still felt too slow.

By the time his vehicle turned onto the street, two patrol cars blocked the curb. Margaret stood beside an officer, furious and shaken, one hand pressed against a scrape on her forearm.

Clara was still inside the locked car exactly as Ben had told her.

He opened the rear door.

She launched herself into him.

"Scout!"

"I know."

"He went in after Grandma."

Margaret shook her head. "I opened the door because I thought you had left it that way. Then I heard something upstairs. Scout pushed past me. I backed out."

A patrol officer approached.

"House is clear. No suspect inside. Your dog is upstairs with another officer."

Ben exhaled for what felt like the first time in minutes.

"Damage?"

"Home office searched. Bedroom drawers opened. Nothing obvious taken yet."

Inside, Scout stood in the upstairs hall, body still, eyes fixed on the half-open attic access panel.

"Scout," Ben said.

The dog looked at him, then back at the panel.

One officer raised a flashlight.

"We cleared the attic. Empty. But he keeps alerting here."

Ben studied the molding.

A thin black wire protruded where no wire should be.

Police called a technician.

Behind the trim they found a tiny camera aimed down the hallway toward Ben's office and Clara's room.

Margaret covered her mouth.

Clara didn't understand at first.

Then she did.

"Someone was watching us?"

Ben knelt in front of her.

"Someone put something here that they had no right to put here. The police are taking it away."

Her eyes filled.

"Because of my project?"

"No." His answer was immediate. "Because adults made bad choices. Not because you drew Scout."

A technician called from Ben's office.

"Staff Sergeant, you should see this."

Inside the desk drawer, underneath a stack of old training manuals, police found a small electronic transmitter.

Not his.

Beside it was a paper Ben recognized instantly.

Clara's original interview notes.

The pages that had disappeared from her project folder three days earlier.

On the back of the last sheet, written in black marker, were four words:

WE KNOW YOUR SCHEDULE.

Then Ben's phone rang.

Detective Cole.

"We found Rachel Wynn," she said.

Ben tightened his grip on the phone.

"Where?"

"At the school."

"Doing what?"

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Cole paused.

"Waiting for Clara."