My Stepbrother Silenced Me for 72 Hours, Then Begged Me to Talk novel · Chapter 12 of 24

Chapter 12: Zero Hour

At a quarter to eight in the morning, the Lindholm gatehouse smelled like pretzels and burnt coffee.

Gus sat in his swivel chair in front of eight screens with a tape cassette in each hand.

"It's labeled Miscellaneous," he said proudly. "I'm very organized."

"Gus," I said, and hugged him so hard his reading glasses fell off the cord.

"Easy, kid. I've got a sore back and a girlfriend. We made up, by the way. The soup worked."

"I knew it would."

"Sit," Gus said. "You're going to want to sit."

Reed stood behind my chair with his arms crossed.

He had held me all night, and now he stood an arm's length away, and I knew it was on purpose.

"This is the guest hallway upstairs at the house," Gus said, and slid the tape into a player. "Sunday night, ten past nine. The house has a little microphone on that camera, for the nanny from the old days. Nobody remembers it's there but me."

A black-and-white picture came up on the middle screen.

It showed the long carpeted hallway outside the guest room where I had been locked in.

Melody walked into the frame with her phone to her ear, in her pastel cardigan.

She was smiling.

I had never seen her smile like that when anyone was looking.

"No, listen," Melody said, tinny and clear from the speaker. "I have her whole county file. Mom's lawyer sent it to the house by mistake and I made a copy before anyone noticed."

A pause, and a giggle.

"The foster families, the caseworker notes, the part about the bench in Westlake Park. All of it. I'm going to read it out at the showcase on Friday with Mom and Dad in the front row."

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