Chapter 10 - Daniel Came for Ethan
I locked every door.
Then I called 911.
My mother took Ethan upstairs.
He refused.
“I’m not hiding.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No.”
“Ethan.”
His face crumpled.
“Mom hid and she still died.”
The sentence stopped me.
I crouched.
“Your mom didn’t hide because she was weak.”
“I know.”
“She hid evidence because she was trying to protect you.”
He swallowed.
“So protect what she protected.”
That worked.
My mother took him into the upstairs closet that had no exterior windows.
Lena was eight minutes away.
A patrol car was four.
Daniel reached the driveway in two.
He came in a rental sedan.
No dark pickup.
No luggage.
He walked to the front door and knocked.
Not pounded.
Knocked.
“Claire.”
I did not answer.
“I know you’re in there.”
I stood behind the locked door with my phone recording.
“You need to leave.”
“I need to see my son.”
“You have a court restriction.”
“It’s temporary.”
“Leave.”
“I’m not here to fight.”
“Then leave.”
He laughed bitterly.
“You’ve taken everything.”
“I did not take Megan.”
Silence.
Then he said, “You think I killed her.”
“I think investigators should decide.”
“You have been feeding them every paranoid thing she collected.”
“She was right about the accounts.”
“That does not mean she was right about everything.”
“What was she wrong about?”
“She thought I wanted to steal Ethan’s trust.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Then why did you ask her to change trustee?”
“Because you hate me.”
“That wasn’t the question.”
He hit the door with his palm.
I flinched.
“Let me see my son!”
I did not move.
Sirens sounded in the distance.
Daniel heard them.
His voice dropped.
“You’re going to make him hate me.”
“No.”
I pressed my forehead against the door.
“I’m trying very hard not to.”
That was true.
He stepped back.
For a second, I thought he would leave.
Then glass shattered at the side of the house.
I screamed.
Daniel had thrown a landscaping stone through the small window beside the mudroom.
He reached through.
Unlocked the door.
I backed away.
He stepped inside.
“Ethan!”
“Daniel, stop.”
“I’m not leaving without him.”
He moved toward the stairs.
I blocked him.
He grabbed my shoulders.
Not punched.
Not hit.
Grabbed.
Hard.
“You have no right.”
“And you do?”
His face was inches from mine.
“I am his father.”
“And Megan was his mother.”
His expression changed.
I saw something there.
Grief.
Real grief.
That made everything worse.
Because monsters are easier when they feel nothing.
Daniel whispered, “You don’t know what happened.”
“Then tell me.”
His hands loosened.
For one second, I thought he might.
Then police flooded the foyer.
“Hands!”
Daniel stepped back.
Three officers forced him to the floor.
He did not resist.
Ethan screamed upstairs.
I ran to him.
Daniel shouted from below.
“Ethan! I didn’t kill your mother!”
My nephew started shaking.
I covered his ears.
Police arrested Daniel for violating the protective order, unlawful entry, and assault.
Still not murder.
But now prosecutors had leverage.
His phone was seized.
The rental car was searched.
Inside the trunk was a duffel bag.
Clothes.
Cash.
Passport.
And a printed map.
The route led west.
Out of North Carolina.
Maybe he was planning to run after taking Ethan.
Maybe he would claim a road trip.
The worst item was smaller.
A plastic zip bag containing prescription bottles.
Megan’s prescription bottles.
The original ones from the bus station were already in evidence.
These were duplicates.
Same medications.
Different fill dates.
The sedative bottle had Daniel’s fingerprints on it.
Marcus asked pharmacy investigators to compare pill counts.
The prescription had been filled for thirty tablets.
Megan’s medication log showed she took only six.
Twenty-four should have remained.
The bottle from the locker had eight.
The bottle in Daniel’s bag had none.
That still did not prove what happened to the missing pills.
Then his phone extraction revealed a deleted search from the night Megan died.
how long clonazepam stays in blood after death
Time: 7:14 p.m.
Megan’s estimated time of death:
between 8:00 and 9:00 p.m.
— — —
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