Chapter 6 - SOMEONE WAS WATCHING MY HOUSE
I went to every window before Detective Ortiz finished the call.
The blinds were already closed, but suddenly that did not feel like enough.
The photograph found on the phone had been taken yesterday.
That meant Jason or someone working for him had been close to my house after Emily came home with me.
Close enough to watch.
Close enough to photograph.
Close enough to know our routines.
I checked the locks twice.
Then I moved a chair under the back door handle even though the deadbolt worked perfectly.
Emily watched me from the hallway.
“Is he coming?”
I turned around immediately.
“No.”
The answer was more confident than the truth.
“He is not coming inside this house.”
Emily looked toward the dark windows.
“That’s different.”
I hated how quickly she noticed.
“Yes.”
“It is.”
I called the patrol supervisor and asked whether an officer could remain nearby overnight.
By midnight, a marked cruiser was parked two houses down.
I should have felt safer.
Instead, I wondered whether the person watching us had already learned the officer’s schedule.
At 1:30 in the morning, Ortiz sent me one still image from the recovered phone.
It showed me leaving Karen’s office three weeks earlier with a folder under my arm.
The folder contained the trust amendment Jason had tried to get me to sign.
I stared at the picture until I understood the implication.
Jason had not simply hoped I would sign the document.
He had monitored what I did with it.
He knew I took it to a lawyer.
He knew I had refused after receiving legal advice.
That may have been the moment I became a problem he intended to solve.
The next morning, a financial crimes investigator named Owen Price joined Ortiz at my house.
He was quiet, thin, and carried two laptops in a battered black bag.
He explained that the invoices found at the North Creek property appeared to connect Jason to a network of shell companies.
Many had ordinary names.
Greenway Maintenance.
North Creek Animal Services.
Redwood Property Repair.
The businesses billed apartment complexes and private owners for work that either cost far less than claimed or never happened at all.
Money moved through several accounts before reaching companies controlled by Jason or Rebecca Sloan.
“How much?”
Price looked at Ortiz before answering.
“We have only reviewed a fraction.”
“How much?”
“At least one point three million dollars over five years.”
I sat back.
“And Sarah found this?”
“We think she found part of it.”
“Her journal mentions an account she did not recognize.”
Price opened a scanned bank statement.
A transfer of thirty-eight thousand dollars had left a joint investment account Sarah shared with Jason.
It went to a company called Morrow Education Services.
No such operating company existed at the listed address.
The account then sent money to Rebecca.
“Why would he need Emily’s trust if he was already stealing that much?”
Price’s face remained neutral.
“People who commit financial fraud do not usually stop because they have enough.”
He showed me another page.
Jason had accumulated large debts through speculative real-estate deals.
Several loans were personally guaranteed.
Two lenders had begun collection actions.
The trust held enough money to cover most of those debts.
My anger became almost physical.
Emily’s grandfather had built that fund over twenty years.
He had skipped luxury vacations and driven old cars because he wanted his only grandchild to have choices.
Jason had looked at that future and seen a rescue account for himself.
Price leaned forward.
“There is another reason the trust matters.”
“What?”
“Your signature.”
“I never signed anything.”
“Exactly.”
“If Jason forged Sarah’s authorization and created a financial agent, he could still face verification problems because you are co-trustee.”
“So he needed me.”
“Or he needed you removed from the process.”
The room became silent.
I looked at Ortiz.
“Removed how?”
Price answered carefully.
“A court could suspend a trustee found incompetent, unavailable, or acting against the beneficiary’s interests.”
I thought of the filings accusing me of aggression and contamination.
“He wanted a record that I was unstable.”
Ortiz nodded.
“Possibly.”
“And Sarah too.”
“Yes.”
“So if both biological parents looked unfit…”
Price finished the thought.
“Someone could petition for a replacement trustee.”
My hands went cold.
Jason was not Emily’s legal parent.
But he had spent four years presenting himself as a devoted stepfather.
He volunteered at school events.
He coached one season of soccer.
He attended pediatric appointments when Sarah could not.
He had created the appearance of being the stable adult in the middle.
The same appearance he was trying to preserve now.
The metal enclosure was not random cruelty.
It was leverage against Sarah.
The fake affidavit was not only about custody.
It was part of a paper trail.
The anonymous texts were not only threats.
They were attempts to make me behave badly enough to support Jason’s story.
I felt nauseated.
“How long has he been planning this?”
Price closed his laptop.
“Longer than this week.”
Ortiz then told me the phone containing my surveillance photographs had been wiped remotely less than an hour after police found it.
Fortunately, the forensic team had isolated it before the deletion completed.
They recovered partial contact data.
One recurring number belonged to Rebecca.
Another belonged to a prepaid phone.
A third number surprised Ortiz enough that she did not tell me the owner.
“What aren’t you saying?”
“I need to verify something.”
“Is it Baines?”
She looked at me.
“I did not say that.”
“You also did not say no.”
Ortiz stood.
“Do not contact Detective Baines.”
I almost laughed.
“I was not planning to invite him to dinner.”
“I am serious.”
“So am I.”
She left with Price.
Two hours later, my phone rang from an unknown local number.
I let it go to voicemail.
The caller tried again.
Then a text arrived.
Daniel, it’s Calvin Baines.
I need five minutes off the record.
I stared at the message.
Every instinct told me not to answer.
I forwarded it to Ortiz.
She called immediately.
“Do not respond.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“Where are you?”
“Home.”
“Is the patrol car still outside?”
“Yes.”
“Stay there.”
“What did you find?”
“Daniel.”
“Stop protecting me from information that involves my child.”
Her voice lowered.
“The third number on the recovered phone is registered to Baines’s wife.”
I sat down.
“That proves what?”
“Nothing by itself.”
“His wife runs a cleaning company that serviced one of Jason’s apartment properties.”
“Payments from that property are in the invoice records.”
“Are the payments fake?”
“We are checking.”
“And the sewing box?”
“We pulled garage footage.”
My heart began pounding.
“Was Baines on it?”
“Not carrying the box.”
“Who was?”
“A uniformed officer brought an evidence tote out of the house.”
“That tote was placed in an unmonitored staging area for seventeen minutes.”
“When it reached the evidence van, the sewing box was not inside.”
“Who was near the staging area?”
“Several people.”
“Baines?”
“Yes.”
I closed my eyes.
“So your partner may be helping Jason.”
“My former partner for purposes of this investigation.”
That wording told me more than she intended.
“You removed him.”
“He has been reassigned while internal affairs reviews the contact.”
“Does he know why?”
“He knows there is a conflict review.”
“And now he wants me off the record.”
“Yes.”
Another text arrived from Baines.
If Ortiz tells you I’m dirty, ask her why she hid the motel camera footage.
I read it aloud.
Ortiz went silent.
“What motel footage?”
“Do not engage with him.”
“What footage?”
She exhaled.
“The motel in the old photograph has security cameras.”
“We obtained archived footage from May.”
“And?”
“It shows Sarah arriving.”
“With Jason?”
“No.”
“With Rebecca?”
“No.”
“Who?”
Ortiz paused.
“Sarah arrived alone.”
I frowned.
“Why does that matter?”
“Because she met someone in the room.”
My chest tightened.
“Who?”
“Baines.”
For a moment, I could not process the answer.
“Your partner met my ex-wife four months ago at a motel?”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“I did not know what the meeting meant.”
“Do you now?”
“No.”
I stood and paced toward the window.
“Maybe Sarah was having an affair with him.”
The words tasted ridiculous and painful.
“Maybe he was helping her.”
“Maybe he was helping Jason.”
“Those are all possibilities.”
I looked at the patrol car outside.
“Did Sarah mention Baines in her journal?”
“Not by name.”
“Did she mention police?”
“Yes.”
“What did she write?”
Ortiz was silent again.
Then she quoted a short line.
I tried to tell someone, but I picked the wrong person.
I felt the floor disappear beneath me.
“Baines.”
“Maybe.”
“What if Sarah went to him for help and he told Jason?”
“That is one of the things internal affairs is investigating.”
Another message from Baines arrived.
She came to me because she was afraid of Jason.
I tried to help her.
Ortiz is going to make me the fall guy.
Then a fourth message.
I know where Sarah might be.
I stared at the screen.
Ortiz’s voice became urgent.
“Do not answer.”
“He says he knows where she is.”
“He wants you to react.”
“What if he actually knows?”
“Then he can tell me through counsel.”
“Sarah may not have time for internal affairs procedures.”
“Daniel.”
I looked toward Emily’s room.
“I am not meeting him.”
“Good.”
“But I am forwarding every message.”
“Good.”
Baines sent an address before Ortiz could finish speaking.
It was a roadside diner twelve miles away.
Meet me at eight.
Come alone if you want the truth.
I showed Ortiz.
She became very quiet.
Then she said something that surprised me.
“Answer him.”
I stared at the phone.
“You just told me not to.”
“I changed my mind.”
“Why?”
“Because if he is willing to meet, we can control the meeting.”
A plan formed quickly.
I would arrive wearing a recording device.
Ortiz and internal affairs officers would be nearby.
Emily would stay with Karen at a location Jason did not know.
I hated every part of it.
I agreed anyway.
The hour before the meeting was worse than the meeting itself.
Internal affairs fitted me with a recorder and explained where officers would be positioned.
They warned me not to accuse Baines directly unless he raised the subject first.
They warned me not to promise anything.
They warned me not to follow him if he tried to move the meeting.
Every instruction sounded simple until I pictured Sarah somewhere waiting while we followed rules.
Ortiz saw what I was thinking.
“Procedure is not the enemy tonight.”
“Delay is.”
“We are trying to avoid both.”
I nodded.
Before leaving, I checked on Emily.
She was sitting cross-legged on Karen’s office sofa with a blanket over her knees.
“Are you going to find Mom?”
“I’m going to talk to someone who may know something.”
“Is it Jason?”
“No.”
She studied my face.
“Are you mad?”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to do angry-man things?”
The phrase came from Jason’s threat.
I crouched in front of her.
“No.”
“I am going to do careful-dad things.”
Emily considered that.
“Mom would like that.”
So would the police, I thought.
More importantly, Jason would not.
At 7:58, I entered the diner and saw Baines sitting alone in the back booth.
He looked exhausted.
There was a bruise along his jaw I had not seen before.
I sat across from him.
“Where is Sarah?”
He looked past me toward the window.
“I don’t know.”
I nearly stood.
“You said you did.”
“I said I know where she might be.”
“Then tell me.”
Baines leaned forward.
“First you need to understand something.”
“What?”
“The reason Sarah met me at that motel in May.”
I waited.
“She was not meeting me as a detective.”
“What does that mean?”
“She was meeting me because she knew my sister.”
I frowned.
“Who is your sister?”
Baines looked directly at me.
May you like
“Jason Cole’s first wife.”
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