Chapter 4 - THE THING INSIDE THE BACKPACK
I sat down on the floor.
“Okay.”
Lily slowly unwrapped the purple shirt.
Inside was a small digital voice recorder.
The kind children used for school projects.
I stared at it.
“Where did you get that?”
She looked toward the bedroom door.
Then she whispered.
“Mommy said I could never show anyone.”
My heart began beating faster.
“Why?”
Lily's hands tightened around the recorder.
“Because you would go away.”
I felt the blood drain from my face.
“Who said I would go away?”
“Mommy.”
I stared at her.
“What is on that?”
She shook her head.
“I don’t know.”
“Have you listened to it?”
She nodded.
“When?”
“When Mommy is asleep.”
I looked at the recorder.
“Can I hear it?”
Lily stared at me for a long time.
Then she pressed the button.
Static filled the room.
I heard breathing.
Then a man's voice.
“Where is the money?”
I froze.
Lily flinched.
The voice continued.
“You promised me the girl would never talk.”
My eyes moved to Lily.
She was trembling.
Another voice answered.
A woman.
Claire.
“I told you, Daniel is dead.”
My body went cold.
The man's voice laughed.
“Dead men don't send messages.”
I stared at the recorder.
Claire's voice became sharper.
“You need to leave my family alone.”
“You should have thought about that before you took what belonged to me.”
The recording crackled.
Then the man said something that made my blood freeze.
“The child knows.”
The recording stopped.
For several seconds, neither of us moved.
I looked at Lily.
“Who is Daniel?”
She shook her head.
“I don't know.”
“Lily, the man said your name?”
She nodded.
“Did you record this?”
“No.”
“Then who did?”
She pointed toward the hallway.
My heart stopped.
“Where did you find this?”
“Under the stairs.”
“Who put it there?”
She shook her head.
“I found it last week.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“Mommy said you would leave if you knew.”
I moved closer.
She immediately tensed.
I stopped.
“Lily,” I said carefully. “I am not leaving.”
She began to cry.
“I don’t want you to die.”
The words struck me harder than anything I had heard in my life.
I stared at her.
“What?”
She covered her face.
“Mommy said bad things happen to men who ask too many questions.”
I felt something inside me break.
I reached for my phone.
Then stopped.
I had been a nurse for twelve years.
I knew how to handle emergencies.
But this wasn't an emergency I could treat with gauze and medication.
This was my family.
And someone had been frightening a seven-year-old child into silence.
I looked at the recorder again.
“Lily,” I whispered. “Is there anything else?”
She nodded.
“What?”
She pointed toward her backpack.
“There's a picture.”
I opened the front pocket.
Inside was a photograph.
A man stood beside a younger Claire.
The man's face had been scratched out.
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On the back of the photograph, someone had written:
HE KNOWS WHAT SHE DID.
