Chapter 8 - The Upload
Police treated the brake line as suspicious, not proof.
Claire treated it as a warning.
She changed the locks on her apartment that morning.
Officer Martinez arranged for a detective to collect Daniel's financial documents.
And by noon, Daniel's attorney, Naomi Price, was sitting at Claire's kitchen table with a laptop open.
“Daniel came to me six weeks ago,” Naomi said.
Ethan sat beside Lily, both wrapped in the same blanket.
“Why?”
“He wanted to revise his estate plan and protect accounts set aside for you and Lily.”
Amanda had told Ethan many times that Daniel loved Lily more because Lily was his “real family” with Amanda.
Now Naomi turned the screen toward him.
A trust document showed two names.
ETHAN DANIEL BROOKS.
LILY GRACE BROOKS.
Equal shares.
Ethan stared.
“He left us the same?”
“Your father doesn't divide children into real and not real.”
Lily squeezed Ethan's hand.
“I told you.”
Naomi smiled sadly, then clicked another folder.
“The recorder Daniel gave you was designed to save locally and upload encrypted audio when you held the side button for three seconds.”
Ethan's heart jumped.
“So Amanda didn't break it?”
“She broke the hardware. Not what it sent.”
“Where did it go?”
“To a secure account Daniel created.”
Naomi typed a password from the attorney letter.
Thirty-two audio files appeared.
The earliest was dated four days ago.
The latest was from the dinner table.
Lily whispered, “Play it.”
Naomi hesitated. “Some of this may be hard to hear.”
“I already heard it,” Ethan said.
That stopped her.
She pressed play.
Amanda's voice filled the kitchen.
“Where is the office key?”
“I don't know.”
“Then you don't need breakfast.”
Another file.
“If you tell your father I didn't feed you, I'll tell him you refused.”
Another.
“Lily is my child. You are baggage from before me.”
Claire covered her mouth.
Ethan looked down.
Hearing it again was worse.
Because this time adults were hearing it too.
Naomi clicked the final file.
Dinner sounds.
Lily asking about chicken.
Amanda saying, “He is not your real brother.”
Then shouting.
The recorder hitting the counter.
But the file did not end there.
The microphone kept transmitting for forty-three seconds after the casing broke.
Amanda's voice became distant.
“Both of you go upstairs.”
Footsteps.
Then Trent's voice came through Amanda's phone speaker.
“Did you find Daniel's key?”
“No.”
“You need that drive before the lawyer gets it.”
“He gave the boy a recorder.”
A pause.
Then Trent said, “Then we move tonight.”
Amanda whispered, “And Daniel?”
Trent's answer was almost too quiet to hear.
“He shouldn't have made it out of that truck.”
Nobody in Claire's kitchen moved.
Naomi replayed the line.
Once.
May you like
Twice.
Then the front window shattered.
