Chapter 8: The Study
The second warrant came through on Tuesday.
Grace drove Sarah to the house.
They waited outside in the car while Marsh and Reyes went in first.
Two other officers were already on the property.
The street was quiet.
A neighbor across the road stood at her window and then moved away when Sarah looked up.
The house looked the same from the outside.
It always had.
"You don't have to go in," Grace said.
"I want to see the study," Sarah said.
"Whatever is in there—"
"I want to see it," Sarah said again.
They went in through the front door.
The cellar had been sealed with police tape.
Sarah didn't look at it.
She walked straight to the stairs and up to the second floor.
The study door was open.
Marsh was inside.
She stepped back when Sarah entered.
The room was large.
A desk, a filing cabinet, a long worktable along one wall.
On the worktable: printed documents, organized into stacks.
A laptop.
A whiteboard on the wall with names and dates written in Richard's handwriting.
Sarah's name was on the whiteboard.
So was Ethan's.
So was Carla Voss's.
And beside Carla's name, an arrow pointing to a column of numbers.
"What are those?" Sarah asked.
"Account transfers," Reyes said.
"Going back approximately two years.
We've flagged them for the financial crimes unit."
Sarah looked at the whiteboard.
At her own name written in Richard's hand.
At the dates beside it.
One date was circled.
It was three weeks from today.
"What's significant about that date?" Grace asked.
Marsh pointed to a document on the desk.
"It's the date of a court filing.
A custody petition."
Grace crossed to the desk and looked at the document without touching it.
"He was going to file for full custody," she said.
"Already prepared," Marsh said.
"His attorney's name is on the filing.
It was ready to go."
Sarah looked at the circled date.
Three weeks.
He had already had a timeline.
She had been in the passage for three days and he had already had a timeline.
"He was going to say I abandoned Ethan," Sarah said.
"He was going to say I left.
Three days in the passage, then he lets me out, tells me to go, and files the petition before I can get an attorney."
"That's consistent with what we're seeing," Marsh said carefully.
"But I didn't go," Sarah said.
"Ethan found me."
"Yes."
Sarah looked at the whiteboard one more time.
At her name.
At the date.
At the neat, organized handwriting of a man who had planned this the way he planned everything — methodically, patiently, one step at a time.
She turned away from it.
"Is there anything in this room that helps Ethan?" she asked.
Marsh looked at Reyes.
Then back at Sarah.
"The custody filing," Grace said quietly.
"It's evidence of premeditation.
It shows the confinement wasn't impulsive.
He had a plan before it happened."
"That's what I thought," Sarah said.
She walked to the window.
The back garden was below — the one Ethan had played in every summer since he was four.
The swing set Richard had built was still there, slightly rusted now, listing to one side.
Ethan had stopped using it two years ago.
Sarah had thought it was just growing up.
She turned back to the room.
"I need to get Ethan's things," she said.
"His books.
His clothes.
His laptop for school."
"We can arrange a supervised retrieval," Marsh said.
"Tomorrow, if you'd like."
"Yes," Sarah said.
"Tomorrow."
She walked to the door.
Then stopped.
On the filing cabinet, in a plain frame, was a photograph she hadn't seen before.
Richard and Ethan at a football game.
Ethan was eight or nine.
He was laughing at something off-camera.
Richard had his arm around him, but he wasn't looking at Ethan.
He was looking at the camera.
Smiling at whoever was taking the picture.
Sarah looked at the photograph for a long moment.
Then she walked out of the study and down the stairs and out of the house without looking back.
In the car, Grace waited.
"Are you all right?" she asked.
"He never looked at him," Sarah said.
"What?"
"In the photograph.
Ethan was laughing and Richard was looking at the camera." She put on her seatbelt.
"I don't think he ever actually looked at him."
Grace started the car.
"Ethan looked at you," Grace said.
"Every time.
That's what matters."
Sarah looked out the window as the house moved past and then disappeared.
May you like
"Drive, please," she said.
Grace drove.
