Chapter 4 - Digital Footprints
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Fifteen minutes later, Lincoln’s unmarked black van pulled up alongside my town car. I jumped into the passenger seat of his vehicle, surrounded by monitors, signal analyzers, and hard drives.
Lincoln didn't waste time on pleasantries. He plugged his encrypted laptop into a high-gain wireless receiver and tapped into my home’s local network from three hundred yards away.
“Accessing the basement local storage array now,” Lincoln murmured, his fingers flying across the keyboard. “Let's look at the archived footage from the past three weeks—specifically during your last two business trips.”
The screen flickered, showing high-definition, wide-angle footage from the kitchen camera—a camera Pamela undoubtedly believed was disabled.
The timestamp read Tuesday, 8:14 AM—the morning I had left for San Diego three weeks prior.
On the screen, Pamela stood by the kitchen island holding a small glass of orange juice. She pulled a tiny amber dropper bottle from her sweater pocket, unscrewed the cap, and carefully squeezed five clear drops into the juice. She stirred it thoroughly before handing the glass to Matilda, who drank it innocently.
“God in heaven,” I breathed, slamming my fist against the dashboard. “She really did it.”
“Watch the next clip,” Lincoln said, dragging another video file onto the monitor.
The timestamp was two hours later, in the living room. Matilda was crying hysterically, pulling at her hair, her small frame shaking uncontrollably as if experiencing a severe panic attack or neurological reaction. Pamela stood three feet away, holding up her smartphone, recording the child’s agony with a cold, detached expression on her face.
“Show Daddy how impossible you become,” Pamela’s voice echoed clearly through the van’s speakers. “Show him how sick you really are.”
A cold, lethal fury settled deep into my chest. I stared at the screen, watching my precious daughter suffer at the hands of a predator I had welcomed into our home.
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“I’m going back,” I said, reaching for the door handle.
“Hold on, Gregory,” Lincoln caught my arm firmly. “You storm in there now without a legal and medical plan, she’ll hide the bottle and hire a lawyer before nightfall. We need ironclad proof of what that substance is.”
