Chapter 5 - THE MAN WITH THE BADGESheriff Thomas Keene arrived at our property before anyone could stop him.
Then shut the notebook.
Nobody spoke.
Sheriff Thomas Keene had been the face of law enforcement in Cedar Ridge for eighteen years.
He had led Sophie Miller’s disappearance investigation.
He had organized volunteer searches.
He had stood beside Sophie’s parents during televised press conferences.
He had promised the county he would never stop looking for her.
And according to Walter Mercer’s notebook, his name appeared beside unexplained payments dating back more than twenty years.
Mara stepped away.
“I need to call state police.”
Caleb frowned.
“You’re calling people we know nothing about?”
“We need outside jurisdiction.”
Walter’s warning echoed inside my head.
Trust no badge until you know who wears it.
Mara seemed to understand.
She contacted an Arizona Department of Public Safety investigator she had worked with previously.
Captain Evelyn Ross arrived that evening with a small team from Phoenix.
The farmhouse search intensified.
By sunset, investigators discovered an underground passage extending from the crawlspace north toward the quarry.
It wasn’t a natural cave.
Someone had built it.
Rough timber supports lined the walls.
Electrical cables had been installed.
Fresh footprints appeared in several places.
And rattlesnake skins were scattered throughout the tunnels.
The snakes hadn’t simply entered our house accidentally.
Someone had disturbed a den beneath the property.
That explained why they were surfacing.
It did not explain why someone was using the tunnel.
Or why Sophie Miller’s backpack was inside.
The following morning, Mara and Captain Ross entered the passage with two technicians.
I remained outside with Eli.
For almost an hour, nothing happened.
Then radios erupted.
“Possible chamber.”
“Need lights.”
“Watch the south wall.”
“Got another door.”
I stood helplessly near the foundation entrance.
Finally Mara emerged.
Mud covered her jeans.
Her face was pale.
“We found a room.”
“What kind?”
“Come with me.”
Ross objected.
Mara insisted.
“He owns the property.”
They gave me a helmet and protective mask.
The tunnel beneath my home was narrower than I expected.
My shoulders brushed packed earth.
The air smelled like mildew, reptile musk, and old gasoline.
After sixty feet, the tunnel widened.
A steel door stood in the wall.
Behind it was a room roughly fifteen feet square.
Someone had recently lived there.
A mattress.
Food wrappers.
Water jugs.
Battery lanterns.
A folding chair.
And photographs.
Dozens of them.
Photographs of my house.
My truck.
Eli’s school.
Rachel.
Me.
Some had been taken years earlier.
Others weeks earlier.
The most recent showed Eli playing in our backyard three days before the rattlesnake incident.
Someone had been watching us.
On a table sat a binder.
Inside were printed schedules.
My teaching hours.
Eli’s school pickup time.
Rachel’s old work schedule.
Medical appointments.
Bank statements.
Everything.
I stared at Mara.
“Who does this?”
She didn’t answer.
Captain Ross pointed toward the wall.
Five names had been carved into the timber.
WALTER.
RACHEL.
SOPHIE.
BEN.
ELI.
My son’s name looked fresh.
The letters were pale where the blade had cut into dark wood.
Rage flooded through me.
“What does this mean?”
Mara touched the carving beside SOPHIE.
“We don’t know.”
A technician opened a metal locker.
Inside were children’s belongings.
Hair ribbons.
Bracelets.
A blue sneaker.
School photographs.
A stuffed rabbit.
Mara went rigid.
Captain Ross quietly ordered everything photographed.
“How many children?” I asked.
Nobody answered.
Then a technician found a hidden compartment beneath the mattress.
Inside was a laptop.
Recent model.
Still charged.
Ross opened it without connecting to any network.
The desktop contained folders.
My surname was one.
MILLER was another.
Inside the Mercer folder was a video.
Ross played it.
The footage was grainy.
Taken from inside Rachel’s car.
Rachel appeared behind the wheel.
The date stamp was the day she died.
Her hands gripped the steering wheel.
She was crying.
Someone sat beside her.
Only a shoulder was visible.
Rachel said, “I’m done protecting you.”
A male voice answered.
“You don’t understand what happens if this comes out.”
“I understand perfectly.”
“You’ll destroy families.”
“You already did.”
Then Rachel spoke the words that changed everything I believed about her death.
“If anything happens to me, Daniel gets the archive.”
The man leaned toward her.
The video froze before his face appeared.
File corruption.
I felt like I had been punched.
Rachel hadn’t died in some random highway accident.
Someone had threatened her hours before she died.
Mara replayed the audio.
She closed her eyes.
“No.”
“What?”
She rewound it.
Played the man’s voice.
Again.
She whispered, “I know him.”
Captain Ross looked at her.
“Who?”
May you like
Mara’s eyes filled with something between anger and heartbreak.
“That’s my father.”
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