Chapter 2 - Three Missing Minutes
“Deleted by who?” Richard asked.
The security panel offered no answer.
Anna held Leo tighter while Dr. Hayes spoke through the phone, telling them to bring the child in immediately. Vanessa stood near the staircase with her arms folded, the picture of offended innocence.
“Maybe the system clears itself,” she said.
Richard looked at her. “It doesn’t.”
“I wouldn’t know. I don’t spend my life staring at cameras.”
Anna did not miss the insult.
Neither did Richard.
At the pediatric clinic, Leo was examined, X-rayed, and declared bruised but lucky. Anna nearly cried when the doctor said there was no fracture. Richard sat beside his son the whole time, one hand on Leo’s knee.
Vanessa did not come.
On the drive home, Richard stared out the window.
“I owe you an apology.”
Anna kept her eyes on Leo, asleep in his car seat. “For what?”
“For looking at you like I believed her.”
“You did believe her.”
Richard winced.
Anna turned to him. “You hired me to protect your son. I have done that every day for eighteen months. She accused me for ten seconds, and you doubted me.”
“I was scared.”
“So was I.”
He nodded once. “You’re right.”
Back at the mansion, Richard called his head of security, Owen Price.
Owen arrived with a laptop and a face that grew more concerned with every minute.
“The local clip is gone,” he said, “but the camera sends a compressed backup to a remote server.”
Vanessa, sitting across the room, stiffened.
Richard saw it.
“Can you recover it?”
“Maybe. Give me an hour.”
Vanessa stood. “This is insane. We’re treating me like a criminal because a toddler pointed at a camera.”
Anna said, “A toddler who was falling down the stairs.”
Vanessa spun toward her. “You really think you belong here now, don’t you?”
Richard stepped between them. “Enough.”
“No, Richard. You need to hear this. She has been trying to turn you against me since the day she moved in.”
“I don’t live here,” Anna said.
“You practically do.”
Owen’s laptop chimed.
Everyone froze.
He looked at the screen.
“I found the backup.”
Vanessa sat down slowly.
Owen clicked PLAY.
The video showed Leo at the top landing, pushing a toy truck. Vanessa walked into frame.
There was no sound.
She bent down.
She said something to him.
Leo backed away.
Then Vanessa looked directly toward the camera.
And reached up.
The image shook.
A second later, the screen went black.
Richard leaned closer. “She knew exactly where the camera was.”
Owen nodded. “And that’s not the weird part.”
He pulled up the system log.
“There have been eleven manual shutdowns in the past six months.”
Anna felt a chill crawl across her skin.
Richard looked at his sister.
Vanessa whispered, “That proves nothing.”
Owen clicked another file.
“No,” he said. “But this might.”
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The timestamp was from three weeks earlier.
And in the still image, Vanessa was standing inside Leo’s nursery at 2:14 in the morning.
