Chapter 8: What Victor Did Next
He didn't go far.
The police arrived within four minutes — two officers first, then a third car ten minutes after.
I walked them through everything: the passage, Sophie, the photograph, the USB drive, Victor's call.
One of the officers, a woman named PC Hartley, sat across from me at the kitchen table and listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she looked at the drive.
"You haven't listened to it yourself?" she said.
"No."
"We'll need to take it as evidence." She looked at me carefully.
"Do you understand what you're handing over?"
"I understand that it's the only thing that protects Sophie from him," I said.
"And that Mara kept it for years because she knew that.
I'm not going to use it as a bargaining chip.
I'm giving it to you."
PC Hartley picked it up.
"We'll need a full statement.
Tonight if you're able."
"I'm able."
Daniel gave his statement separately, in the living room, while I sat with PC Hartley in the kitchen.
The solicitor's documentation arrived by email at 1:47 in the morning — the formal letter, the DNA results, Mara's signed declaration naming me as Sophie's father and intended guardian.
PC Hartley reviewed it on her tablet.
"This is solid," she said.
"Can he challenge it?"
"He can try.
People with money usually do." She set the tablet down.
"But the recording, combined with this documentation and the circumstances of tonight — the threat, the surveillance, the call — that's a pattern.
That's not a custody dispute.
That's something else."
"What happens to him?"
"That depends on what's on the drive." She stood up.
"But I'd suggest you get a family solicitor on the phone first thing in the morning.
Today, I mean." She glanced at the window.
It was nearly two a.m.
"You want to have Sophie's guardianship formally filed before he can make any counter-move."
I walked her to the door.
"Mr.
Callahan," she said, pausing on the step.
"The little girl.
Is she all right?"
"She's at a neighbor's house with my wife and daughter."
"Good." She nodded once.
"Keep her there tonight."
I closed the door.
The house was quiet.
The passage behind Lily's closet wall was still open — the wooden panel leaning against the wall where I'd left it hours ago.
I walked down the hall and looked into the dark space behind it.
A folded blanket.
A small plastic cup.
Three picture books stacked in the corner.
Sophie had made it as much of a home as she could.
I picked up the picture books and carried them to the kitchen table.
I sat down.
I didn't do anything else for a while.
I just sat there with the books in front of me and thought about a woman I'd known as Amy Callahan, who had been brave enough to survive for years on her own, and who had spent her last months making sure her daughter would be safe after she was gone.
My phone buzzed.
Claire.
*Girls are asleep.
Sophie asked if you were coming.
May you like
I didn't know what to tell her.*
I typed back: *Tell her yes.*
