Chapter 4: The Threat in the Night
I didn’t sleep that night.
I sat in a chair in the hallway between the children’s rooms, a baseball bat resting against my knee. Every creak of the building made me jump.
At 3:00 AM, my phone buzzed. A text from an unknown number.
> You made a mistake. You should have just let me handle them. Now you’re going to pay. Accidents happen to children all the time, Daniel. Watch your back.
I screenshotted it and sent it to Patricia.
“Richard,” I whispered.
The next morning, at 9:00 AM sharp, the buzzer rang. It wasn’t the police yet—it was Social Services. Grace Humphrey.
She was a kind woman with sharp eyes. She walked through the apartment, checking the fridge (which I had restocked at midnight), checking the children’s beds.
She interviewed Sophie alone. I paced the hallway, terrified Sophie would be too scared to speak.
When Grace came out, her eyes were red.
“Mr. Morrison,” she said softly. “You are doing the right thing. Sophie told me… she told me about the closet.”
“The closet?”
“Isabelle used to lock her in the linen closet for hours,” Grace said, her voice trembling with suppressed rage. “In the dark. She told her that’s where ‘bad girls’ go.”
Grace put a hand on my arm. “I’m recommending immediate full custody for you. And I’ve already forwarded my report to the District Attorney. They are issuing a warrant.”
Just then, the elevator dinged.
My security team stepped forward, hands on their holsters. But it wasn’t an intruder.
It was Maria. Our old nanny. Isabelle had fired her six months ago, claiming Maria had been stealing. I had believed Isabelle.
Maria was crying. She rushed over to me.
“Mr. Daniel, I saw the news… I saw the rumors online,” she wept. “I came as soon as I could. I have proof.”
“Proof?”
“I didn’t steal,” she said, pulling out an old phone. “She fired me because I took these.”
She handed me the phone.
Photos. dozens of them. Sophie with a black eye. Nathan with a split lip. Isabelle passed out on the sofa with wine bottles while the children cried in the background.
“I tried to text you,” Maria sobbed. “But she blocked my number on your phone. She told me if I went to the police, she’d have my family deported. I was so scared.”
“You’re here now,” I said, hugging her. “You’re brave. And this… this is the final nail in her coffin.”
Patricia burst into the room a moment later, phone pressed to her ear.
“They got them,” she shouted.
“Both of them?”
“Isabelle and Richard. They were caught at the airport trying to board a flight to Mexico. They’re in custody.”
I slumped against the wall, sliding down until I hit the floor. The relief was so physical it hurt.
“It’s over,” I whispered.
But as I looked at Sophie, who was watching me from the doorway with timid, fearful eyes, I knew it wasn’t over.
The monster was in a cage, but the damage she had done was deep. The trial was coming. The media circus was coming. And I had to fight to make sure she never saw the light of day again.
“Come here, baby,” I opened my arms.
Sophie ran to me, burying her face in my shoulder.
“Is she gone?” she asked.
“She’s gone,” I promised. “And I am going to make sure she pays for every single tear you cried.”
