Chapter 5 - Behind the Nursery Vent.
I drove home faster than I should have.
Nora followed in her own car, and Officer Ramirez was only a few minutes behind us.
Lena opened the front door before I reached it.
Her face told me the situation was serious but not immediately dangerous.
“Frederick is asleep.”
“Where’s Amy?”
“Nursery.”
I took the stairs two at a time.
Amy stood in the middle of Frederick’s room holding a small white plastic device inside a clean kitchen towel.
The air vent beneath the window had been removed from the wall.
“What is that?”
“I don’t know.”
Her voice shook.
“I heard something rattle when the air turned on.”
Lena had apparently used a screwdriver to loosen the vent.
Behind it, taped to the inside edge, was the device.
Nora arrived and stopped in the doorway.
“Don’t touch it anymore.”
Amy looked guilty.
“I already did.”
“That’s okay.”
Nora remained calm.
“Just set it down.”
Ramirez arrived a minute later and examined it without turning it on.
“It looks like a small audio recorder.”
Amy’s face went pale.
“In Frederick’s room?”
“We need to verify what it is.”
I stared at the open vent.
My mother had spent countless afternoons in this room after Frederick was born.
She had rocked him in the chair.
She had folded his clothes.
She had volunteered to change air filters because she said new parents had enough to remember.
I suddenly remembered her standing near that exact vent with a screwdriver six weeks earlier.
At the time, I had thanked her.
I sat on the edge of the changing table because my knees felt weak.
Amy looked at me.
“You remember something.”
“She changed the filter.”
“When?”
“Maybe six weeks ago.”
Amy closed her eyes.
“That was the day she asked me about our argument.”
“What argument?”
“The one about your work schedule.”
I remembered that too.
It had been a small fight.
I had promised to be home by six and arrived after nine because a subcontractor issue had blown up.
Amy had been exhausted.
She told me I could not keep assuming she would absorb every surprise because I worked long hours.
She was right.
We argued quietly in the nursery while Frederick slept.
Nobody else should have heard it.
Two days later, Teresa called me and said Amy seemed resentful of my career.
At the time, I assumed Amy had talked to her.
I looked at Amy.
“Did you tell Mom about that fight?”
“No.”
“Not even afterward?”
“Never.”
Ramirez placed the device in an evidence bag.
“If this recorded conversations, we will find out.”
Nora asked Amy whether Teresa had installed or touched anything else in the house.
Amy began mentally walking through months of visits.
Kitchen smoke detector.
Baby monitor.
Garage keypad.
A loose cabinet hinge.
The upstairs router because Wi-Fi had been weak.
Every helpful act now looked different.
We decided not to tear the house apart ourselves.
Ramirez arranged for an officer and a digital evidence technician to conduct a careful sweep with our permission.
Two more devices were found before sunset.
One was another audio recorder attached beneath the desk in our home office.
The other was a small memory card taped inside the back panel of an old printer Teresa had given us.
The printer was not connected to the internet.
The card contained scanned images.
Hundreds of them.
Bank statements.
Insurance pages.
Mortgage records.
My passport.
Amy’s passport.
Frederick’s Social Security card.
The same documents we had found in the storage unit.
Some files were dated before Frederick was born.
My mother’s plan had not started after Amy became a mother.
It had started earlier.
The digital technician found a folder labeled A.
Inside were screenshots of text conversations between Amy and me.
Some were genuine.
Some were edited.
One screenshot made it appear that Amy had written, I don’t care what your mother needs, I want the money for myself.
Amy stared at it.
“I never said that.”
I recognized the real conversation.
Months ago, Amy had texted, I don’t care what your mother thinks we need, I want us to decide our own budget.
Someone had removed five words and changed the meaning.
Another screenshot made it appear I had written, Mom understands money better than you do.
My real message had said, Mom understands the grocery program better than I do because she signed us up.
The edits were crude if you knew the originals.
They would look convincing to someone who did not.
Nora took notes.
“She was building competing stories.”
“Again?” I asked.
“One where Amy is greedy and unstable.”
She pointed to another folder.
“One where you are controlling and dismissive.”
“What was she going to do with them?”
Nora looked at me.
“That depends on which of you she needed to pressure.”
Amy sat in the rocking chair with Frederick asleep against her chest.
Her expression was no longer frightened.
It was angry.
I had rarely seen her angry during the past months.
Teresa had taught her that anger would be used as evidence against her.
Now the trap was visible.
Amy looked at Nora.
“If I had confronted Connor with these, we might have destroyed our marriage ourselves.”
“Yes.”
“And if Connor had confronted me?”
“Same result.”
Amy looked down at Frederick.
“She wanted us separated.”
The room became quiet.
I had not wanted to say it first.
Nora did.
“That is a reasonable inference from what we have found.”
I paced toward the window.
“Why?”
“Control.”
“Of what?”
“Potentially money, property, access to your child, family influence.”
Nora closed her notebook.
“We need more evidence before assigning one motive.”
A car door slammed outside.
I looked down.
Aunt Betsy stood beside the curb.
She was alone.
She looked up at the nursery window and saw me.
Then she raised both hands as if approaching a police checkpoint.
“I’ll talk to her,” I said.
Amy stood.
“No.”
I turned.
“I mean, not alone.”
She shifted Frederick carefully.
“I am done being discussed in rooms I’m not in.”
That sentence stopped me.
“You’re right.”
We went downstairs together after Lena took Frederick.
Betsy waited on the porch.
Her makeup was gone, and she looked ten years older than she had at the party.
“I need to tell you something.”
I did not open the door fully.
“Start there.”
Betsy looked toward the patrol car across the street.
“Is Teresa still in jail?”
“For now.”
“She may get released tonight.”
My chest tightened.
“How do you know?”
“Roger spoke to her attorney.”
Amy stood beside me.
Betsy’s eyes dropped.
“I am sorry.”
Amy said nothing.
Betsy swallowed.
“I should have stopped what happened yesterday.”
“Yes,” Amy said.
Betsy flinched.
It was the first time I had heard Amy answer a family apology without immediately making the apologizer comfortable.
Betsy deserved the discomfort.
“What do you need to tell us?” I asked.
She reached into her purse slowly.
I tensed until I saw an old smartphone.
“Teresa gave me this three months ago.”
“Why?”
“She said it was for family planning.”
“What does that mean?”
“She had a group chat she didn’t want on her regular phone.”
Nora had come downstairs and now stood several feet behind us.
Betsy noticed her.
“Who is she?”
“Our attorney.”
Betsy almost laughed from nerves.
“Of course you have an attorney now.”
Amy’s expression hardened.
“We have an attorney because Teresa tried to file paperwork against our house.”
Betsy’s face changed.
“She actually filed it?”
“You knew?”
“I knew she talked about it.”
My anger surged.
“You knew?”
“I thought it was one of her threats.”
“What threats?”
Betsy looked at Amy.
“Can I come inside?”
“No,” Amy said.
Betsy nodded as though she understood exactly why.
She held out the phone.
“Then take this.”
Nora stopped me from accepting it directly and asked Betsy to place it on the porch table.
“What is on it?” Nora asked.
“Messages.”
“Between whom?”
“Teresa, me, Roger, Mason, and two other people.”
“Who?”
Betsy hesitated.
“Pastor Dean from her church.”
I stared at her.
“And a woman named Marla Hines.”
Nora’s eyes sharpened.
“Who is Marla?”
“She’s a notary.”
The porch went silent.
Betsy continued.
“Teresa said she needed witnesses and paperwork in case Amy tried to take Connor’s house.”
“It’s Amy’s house too,” I said.
“I know.”
“Did Mom know?”
Betsy gave me a sad look.
“Connor, your mother has never believed anything Amy has is really hers.”
Amy took a slow breath.
“What was the birthday party for?”
Betsy looked miserable.
“To make you look incapable.”
Amy did not react.
Betsy kept going.
“Teresa wanted everyone to see you overwhelmed.”
“With a sick baby?”
“She said if you couldn’t handle a birthday party and one child, nobody would believe you could handle the house alone.”
I felt the same cold anger I had felt when I first saw the notebook.
“Why would Amy need to handle the house alone?”
Betsy looked at me.
“Because Teresa believed she could make you file for divorce.”
Amy’s hand found mine.
May you like
Betsy’s next sentence was worse.
“And if you didn’t, she planned to make Amy think you already had.”
