Chapter 3 - A Camera Without a Light
Daniel came back to the mansion after midnight. Sophie had been admitted for observation, with Emily staying beside her at the hospital at the child's request. Patricia waited in the kitchen, drinking tea as if the afternoon had never happened.
“The hospital is treating you like a suspect,” she told him.
“They're treating Sophie like a child who almost died.”
Patricia set down her cup. “She rolled away. It was an accident.”
“You said Emily pushed her.”
“I panicked. You know I adore that girl.”
Daniel went straight to the security office. Owen, the night guard, stood when he entered.
“Show me the driveway video.”
Owen brought up the garage camera. At 2:13 p.m., its picture froze. At 2:16, the driveway appeared empty. The entire fall had disappeared.
“A system outage,” Owen said too quickly.
“Only that camera?”
“The service company says a connection failed.”
Daniel noticed an orange warning bar across the screen: LOCAL ACCESS DISABLED. He had installed the cameras himself after Leah's death. They had backup power and local storage.
“Who has administrator access?”
“You. Me. And Mrs. Whitmore.”
“My mother?”
“She asked for it last month. Said she was worried about Sophie.”
Daniel remembered signing the access request without reading it while riding between meetings.
“Save everything you still have,” he ordered.
Owen hesitated. “Your mother asked me to reset the system before breakfast.”
“Don't.”
His phone buzzed. It was Emily, calling from the hospital.
“Sophie is asleep,” she said. “But she asked me why Grandma wanted the blue ribbon.”
“What blue ribbon?”
May you like
Emily took a breath. “The one she tied to the stroller because Sophie kept trying to get out.”
Daniel looked at the frozen picture. In its last clear frame, his mother stood beside the stroller with both hands on the handle.
