Chapter 4 - The Twelve-Year-Old Secret
The digital glow of the laptop screen cast sharp shadows across the motel room walls. I sat frozen, staring at the case file summary from the Fayetteville Police Department archives dated October 14, 2012.
Victim: Lily Vance, Age 1. Circumstances: Infant disappeared from second-bedroom crib between 2:00 A.M. and 3:00 A.M. No signs of forced entry. Back door unlocked. Security system mysteriously disabled for a sixty-second window.
Sixty seconds.
The exact same anomaly.
I looked back at the current date on my computer. Twelve years ago to the week, another little girl had vanished from that very room under identical conditions.
“Daniel,” I whispered, shaking his shoulder.
He groaned, rolling over. “Mel? What time is it? Come to bed.”
“Wake up. Look at this.” I turned the screen toward him.
Daniel rubbed his eyes, squinting at the glowing text. As he read the details, the sleepy haze vanished from his face, replaced by a tense, rigid expression.
“This... this has to be a coincidence,” Daniel said, though his voice lacked conviction. “A statistical anomaly.”
“There are no statistical anomalies like this, Daniel. The previous owner lost his daughter in that house. And now someone is trying to take mine using the exact same method—the sixty-second blackout, the unlocked door, the key.”
“Who was Arthur Vance?” Daniel asked, leaning closer.
“He was an electrical engineer who worked on local municipal grid systems. Which explains how he could manipulate security cameras and power drops.”
“Where is he now?”
I scrolled down to the bottom of the public records search. “He was institutionalized following a mental breakdown after the disappearance. He was released five years ago. And his current registered address is less than three miles from our house.”
Daniel sat up straight, running a hand through his hair. “Mel, you’re not thinking of going over there?”
“I have to. The police think I’m losing my mind. If this man—or someone working with him—is targeting our daughter, the local authorities won’t act fast enough. We need answers.”
Before Daniel could argue, I packed my pistol into its concealed holster, grabbed my jacket, and grabbed my car keys. Daniel cursed softly, pulling on his boots. “I’m coming with you. I’m not letting you walk into a lunatic’s house alone.”
We left Emma sleeping soundly in the motel bed, with Rachel—who had driven down from Raleigh to join us—standing guard outside the door.
Twenty minutes later, our car crept down an overgrown gravel driveway tucked behind an abandoned industrial park on the outskirts of town.
A small, single-story cabin sat at the end of the lane, surrounded by dense pine trees. The windows were dark, save for a faint, flickering blue light glowing from a back room—the unmistakable light of multiple computer monitors.
We parked fifty yards away, cutting our headlights.
“Stay here in the car,” I whispered to Daniel, unlapsung my holster.
“No way. We go together.”
We crept through the pine needles, keeping low against the shadows of the cabin wall. We reached a side window where the blinds were cracked open an inch.
I peered inside.
The room was filled with server racks, glowing monitors, and digital surveillance feeds. On the main screen, live video feeds of our house in Fayetteville—and our motel room in Raleigh—flashed in real-time.
May you like
And sitting in the center of the room, staring intently at a monitor showing Emma sleeping in her crib, was an elderly man with wild white hair and hollow, sunken eyes.
Arthur Vance.
