PART 2
Alec arrived at the house before dawn, photographing the contents of the urn from every angle before forcing Carter to sit down at the kitchen table.
“You spent six years sending this guy money without ever asking for a single official receipt,” Alec noted quietly.
“I did it all for Alvin,” Carter said, staring at his trembling hands.
“You did it because you wanted to believe you were saving what was left,” Alec replied gently.
Over the next four days, they discreetly trailed Chad across town. The first two days were entirely routine, moving between the suburban house, an office complex, and the local supermarket. On the third day, the woman from the hardware store appeared at Chad’s house, unlocked the front door with her own key, and walked right in.
“That isn’t just a casual visitor,” Alec muttered from behind his telephoto lens. “She has her own set of house keys.”
On the fourth day, Chad drove out toward the industrial outskirts of Pineridge, turning into a rundown warehouse complex behind a rusted perimeter fence. He stayed inside a small concrete structure that had once served as a security guardhouse for over an hour.
Alec quickly ran the woman’s license plate and identified her as Michaela Calloway.
Carter felt the air leave his lungs the moment he heard the name. “That’s impossible.”
Michaela had been Nina’s closest friend in college, and according to Chad’s original testimony, Nina had spent her final hours with Michaela right before the tragic car accident.
“That’s why her face looked so familiar to you,” Alec whispered. “She used to visit your home all the time years ago.”
Alec opened a series of recent surveillance photographs on his laptop, showing Chad and Michaela dining together at an upscale restaurant in Fairview, laughing and holding hands over wine glasses. Then Alec flipped to another set of photos taken near the abandoned security booth in Pineridge.
A frail woman with dark-dyed hair and oversized clothing had stepped out of the booth for a few seconds to retrieve a supply bag Chad had left on the ground. She walked with a heavy slouch, but as she reached for the bag, she tilted her head slightly to the right.
Carter stared at the screen, his chest tightening because Nina had made that exact nervous gesture ever since she was a little girl.
“Enlarge that section of the image right now,” Carter demanded.
Alec zoomed in on the woman’s profile until the features became visible.
“It’s her,” Carter breathed, his voice barely audible. “That is my daughter.”
“It looks like someone went to extraordinary lengths six years ago to make the world think she was dead,” Alec said coldly.
They didn’t wait for official backup. That very night, they snuck onto the Pineridge property under the cover of darkness. The guardhouse had running water, basic electricity, and a heavy padlocked door that Alec managed to pick open using his old police toolkit.
The interior was stark, containing a worn mattress, a single electric burner, bottled water, discarded clothes, and dozens of printout photographs taped across the concrete wall.
Every single photo showed young Alvin playing in the park, wearing his school uniform, or eating ice cream with Carter. These were the exact digital photos Carter had emailed to Chad every month so his son-in-law could keep memories of the boy’s growth.
In the far corner of the dim room, a woman sat up in sheer terror, her face thin and pale, her arms marked with old scars.
Carter recognized her eyes before anything else. “Nina…”
She pressed both hands over her mouth to muffle a gasp. “Dad?”
He stepped forward to embrace her, but Nina scrambled backward against the wall as if terrified of physical contact.
“You can’t be here right now,” she sobbed desperately. “If Chad finds out you located this place, everything will be ruined.”
“What did that monster do to you?” Carter begged, kneeling on the dirty floor.
Nina pulled her knees to her chest as tears streamed down her hollow cheeks. “I agreed to stay hidden because they made me believe I murdered Michaela.”
