I immediately stopped talking about the garage.
She looked at me with tired eyes.
“Daddy.”
I took her hand.
“I’m here.”
She leaned against me.
That tiny movement brought me back to the only thing that mattered right then.
She didn’t need an explanation.
She needed to know that the person holding her would not put her back in that room.
A little later, I was told that the video review had found more material.
This time, the responder showed me a still image rather than a video.
It was from another recording.
The angle was different.
The same cage was visible, but the backyard looked darker.
My wife was standing beside it.
She wasn’t holding the baseball bat.
She was holding a notebook.
That detail disturbed me more than I expected.
She had not simply been improvising.
She had been documenting something.
“What was she writing?” I asked.
