Chapter 10 - THE FIRST PERSON
My mind went straight to employees.
Nannies.
Cleaners.
Contractors.
Claire and I had hired dozens of people over the years.
Vanessa gave one name.
"Melissa Ward."
The preschool counselor.
The woman who later joined Hearth.
"She wasn't placed at the preschool for Emma," Vanessa said. "She was placed there because several target families used it."
Ramirez pulled Melissa's employment file.
She had started fourteen months before Claire died.
She left seven months after.
"Where is she now?"
Vanessa shook her head.
"Owen cut contact."
Police found Melissa in Pennsylvania.
She agreed to meet only after receiving immunity advice from her attorney.
She looked exhausted.
"I never entered homes," she said immediately.
"You gave Owen information about children," Ramirez replied.
"At first, anonymous information."
"Then?"
Melissa cried.
"He wanted names of widowed parents. He wanted to know which children had inherited money, which fathers traveled, which families used nannies."
I leaned forward.
"Did you know Claire Mercer?"
Her face changed.
"Yes."
"Did you put a camera in my house?"
"No."
"Who did?"
"I don't know."
"Then why did Vanessa say you were the first person he sent into my life?"
Melissa rubbed her temples.
"Because I referred Claire to a home-safety study."
I remembered.
A company had installed free indoor air-quality sensors during a research promotion.
Claire had thought it was harmless.
The technician had been in Emma's nursery.
"Name."
Melissa whispered, "Caleb Cross."
Owen and Vanessa had another brother.
Police records showed Caleb ran a residential electronics company.
The hidden cameras were his model.
Ramirez issued a warrant.
By evening, officers searched Caleb's warehouse in Queens.
They found boxes of cameras.
Old routers.
Hard drives.
And a wall map covered with addresses.
My house.
Michael's.
Aaron's.
Twelve others.
One address was crossed out in black.
Ramirez checked the name.
"Laura and Ben Holloway."
Michael went pale.
"I know that name."
"How?"
"They were in my grief group."
Ramirez searched state records.
Ben Holloway had died two years earlier.
May you like
His daughter had disappeared six months after.
And no one had ever found her.
