Chapter 3 - The Cameras Were Not Ryan’s
Vanessa immediately claimed the cameras belonged to Ryan.
Ryan stared at her.
“No.”
“They were here before Claire moved in.”
“No, they weren’t.”
The house had belonged to Ryan’s late father, Thomas Bennett.
Ryan inherited it after Thomas died three years earlier.
Vanessa was Thomas’s younger sister.
She had remained close to the family and frequently stayed in the guest
suite.
Ryan knew the house’s official security system.
These cameras were not part of it.
Police photographed the equipment before removing anything.
A technician identified six hidden feeds.
Nursery.
Primary bedroom.
Upstairs hall.
Home office.
Kitchen.
Staircase.
Claire felt violated in a way she could barely describe.
“How long?”
The recorder held ninety days locally.
But the router had been uploading data elsewhere.
Vanessa said nothing.
Noah was taken for medical evaluation.
He had bruising but no serious injury.
The doctor’s report could not determine exactly how he fell.
Claire did not need the report to tell her what Noah had said.
Still, she refused to coach him.
A child-interview specialist later spoke with him using age-appropriate
methods.
Noah’s account remained simple.
He saw a blinking light.
He touched the wooden door.
Vanessa said no.
He tried to go upstairs to Mommy.
Vanessa pushed him.
He fell.
Then she told him he was bad.
Claire cried when she heard.
Ryan did not.
His anger had moved somewhere quieter.
Police searched Vanessa’s room with proper authorization.
They found no camera equipment.
But they found a handwritten number.
A storage locker.
And beside it, three words:
THOMAS — ORIGINAL TAPES.
Ryan stared at his father’s name.
Vanessa finally spoke.
“You don’t understand what he did.”
Ryan looked at her.
“My father?”
“Yes.”
“What did he do?”
May you like
Vanessa’s eyes filled with tears.
“He started watching this house long before I did.”
