Chapter 5 - The Trap Springs
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Daniel slammed his coffee mug onto the marble counter, coffee spilling over the edge.
"You told them I hit you?" he asked, his voice dropping into that terrifying, lethal whisper I knew so well. He stood up, towering over me.
"The camera told them," I replied, refusing to back away.
His face changed instantly. The arrogant confidence shattered, replaced by pure, unadulterated panic. His eyes darted wildly toward the small, inconspicuous black lens I had mounted above the pantry door weeks ago, and then back to his mother.
Lorraine grabbed a wooden barstool and desperately reached upward, trying to claw the device down from the wall.
"Don't bother," I said coldly. "The high-definition file is already safely in the cloud. The police have it."
Daniel’s face flushed a deep, violent crimson. He lunged forward, grabbed my overnight bag from my hand, and violently emptied it onto the kitchen floor. My prenatal vitamins, a toothbrush, and stark white copies of my hospital discharge paperwork scattered wildly across the tile.
"You’re going to pick up that phone, call whoever the hell you spoke to, and fix this right now," Daniel commanded, stepping into my personal space.
"No."
He reacted instinctively, catching my wrist in a vice-like grip. I stayed completely still, though every single survival instinct in my body screamed at me to pull away and run. I needed him to hold on just a few seconds longer.
Through the large front living room window, I saw the morning sunlight flash brilliantly across the windshield of an unmarked county sedan pulling silently to a stop at the curb.
Lorraine saw the vehicle too. Her hand dropped from the camera.
"What did you do, Claire?" Lorraine gasped, her eyes wide with sudden terror.
I looked around the beautiful house—the pale oak cabinets I had lovingly selected with my late aunt, the French garden doors she had adored, the mortgage-free home she had generously left entirely to me three years before I ever made the mistake of meeting Daniel. He had always arrogantly called it "our" house. Lorraine had presumptuously started calling it "hers" after moving into the guest room "for just two weeks" over six months ago.
"I finally read the occupancy documents you aggressively pressured me to sign last week," I said, my voice cutting through the tension like a knife. "My lawyer, Maya, read them too."
May you like
Daniel tightened his painful grip on my wrist, his confusion warring with his anger.
The second vehicle, a massive, fully marked police SUV, pulled up and parked diagonally behind the sedan, effectively blocking the driveway.
