Chapter 5 - THE RABBIT
She hadn't been taken by force.
That was the terrifying part.
A woman arrived claiming to be an authorized family representative.
She had documentation.
Identification.
Electronic authorization.
Everything checked out.
Except none of it was real.
Marcus's company specialized in digital identity systems.
Someone had manufactured a person.
Security footage showed Sophia leaving while holding the woman's hand.
She wasn't crying.
She'd been told her mother was waiting.
I called Marcus.
He answered immediately.
“They took her.”
Silence.
Then:
“What?”
His reaction told me enough.
He hadn't done it.
“Elisa?”
“With me.”
“Ben.”
“Yes.”
For the first time in years, my brother and I were on the same side.
Not because I trusted him.
Because Sophia needed us.
Marcus accessed internal company records voluntarily under law-enforcement supervision.
Benjamin had used credentials to create the fake authorization.
His vehicle was found abandoned.
Sophia's rabbit wasn't with her.
Investigators recovered it from the hospital parking lot.
I picked it up.
Something rattled.
Inside a stitched seam was a memory card.
Sophia had hidden it.
The chair hadn't been the first device she'd discovered.
Months earlier, she'd found the memory card downstairs after seeing Evan.
She'd put it inside Bunny because, in her words later:
“Daddy said nobody touches Bunny.”
The card contained part of the Halcyon archive.
And a video.
Evan Rourke stared into a camera.
“If Michael Reed receives this, assume I've been compromised.”
My heart stopped.
Evan continued.
“Marcus Reed isn't the person running Halcyon.”
I looked toward my brother.
Marcus looked equally stunned.
“Marcus found the surveillance architecture and tried to shut it down. Benjamin Cole prevented him.”
I stared.
Everything changed.
Marcus wasn't innocent.
He'd restrained Evan.
Hidden evidence.
Intimidated his daughter.
Allowed Elisa to silence her.
But he hadn't created the original operation.
Evan continued:
“Ben controls the archive.”
Then he named the person financing it.
Elisa Reed.
My sister-in-law.
Marcus turned toward his wife.
Elisa's face went completely still.
May you like
And for the first time since Christmas dinner, she stopped pretending.
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