Chapter 7: The Brother in the Back Room
Reyes moved fast.
By nine that evening, she had a warrant — not just for Harlan, but for the bakery premises, the attached storage unit two streets over that appeared in the business registration, and the residence listed under Victor Harlan's name.
A second officer had pulled Vic's record while Reyes was still at the hospital taking Rosa's formal statement.
It was not a short record.
Daniel sat in the corridor outside the statement room and waited.
He had called in to the bakery — to the assistant manager, a quiet woman named Greta who had been there twelve years — and told her he would not be back tonight.
Greta had asked no questions.
She had simply said: *I saw the ambulance.
I'm glad you were there.*
At ten past nine, Reyes came out of the statement room.
"She's remarkable," she said, meaning Rosa.
"She's been carrying this alone for months."
"Not entirely alone." Reyes sat down beside him.
"The man Rosa mentioned — the one who moved away suddenly.
We found him.
His name is Arthur Pell.
He's seventy-one.
He moved to his daughter's house in February.
He told his daughter he had been warned to stop asking questions about the children."
"Warned by who?"
"He didn't say.
He was frightened." Reyes paused.
"He's agreed to speak to us now."
Daniel said nothing.
He thought about a seventy-one-year-old man, frightened enough to leave his home without saying goodbye to two children he had been watching over.
"What about Vic?" he asked.
"We picked him up forty minutes ago at his residence.
He had a bag packed." Reyes looked at her notes.
"He's not talking.
But the storage unit is a different story."
"What was in it?"
"Enough to explain the boxes," she said.
"And enough to explain why he needed children to carry them.
Small hands.
Small bodies.
Nothing that looks suspicious to a patrol officer watching a back alley at two in the morning."
The weight of it settled into the corridor like something physical.
"Harlan knew all of it," Daniel said.
It was not a question.
"Harlan organized it," Reyes said.
"Vic was the muscle.
Harlan was the logistics.
The bakery was the front — legitimate business, regular deliveries, nothing unusual.
Except the deliveries weren't always flour and sugar."
"And when Rosa refused to carry the boxes—"
"He needed a way to make her comply without drawing attention.
A freezer in a back room.
A warning.
Something that left no marks." Reyes closed her notebook.
"He underestimated her."
"He underestimated both of them."
Reyes stood.
"I need to get back.
The warrant execution is in an hour.
I wanted you to know — your photograph, your statement, Rosa's testimony, and the security footage are enough.
This is moving forward tonight."
Daniel stood too.
"Harlan is still at the bakery?"
"He's been there since this afternoon.
His attorney arrived at six.
They've been very cooperative." She said the last word with a flatness that made its meaning clear.
"That changes in about fifty minutes."
She started down the corridor, then stopped.
"Mr.
— I'm sorry, I don't think I got your last name."
"Callan," he said.
"Daniel Callan."
"Mr.
Callan.
When you took those photographs this morning — the ones of the back room — did you know something was going to happen today?"
Daniel thought about it honestly.
"No," he said.
"I just knew something was wrong.
I didn't know what yet."
Reyes nodded slowly.
"That's the part that matters," she said.
"Most people know something is wrong.
They just don't take the photograph."
She walked away down the corridor.
May you like
Daniel watched her go.
Then he turned back toward the pediatric ward, where somewhere behind a closed door, a small boy was breathing warm air for the first time in nine and a half hours, and his sister was sitting beside him, finally, finally not alone.
