The message sat there, delivered but unread, a green bubble floating in digital space between a daughter and a father who might already be beyond reaching. I stared at it and tried not to think about why his phone was off, tried not to run the scenarios that a lifetime of crime documentaries—Mom’s crime documentaries, I realized with a chill—had equipped me to imagine.
My phone rang. Mom’s name on the screen. I stared at it through three rings before answering on speaker so Becca could hear.
“Where are you? What’s going on?” Mom’s voice was tight with barely controlled emotion. “I wake up and both my daughters are gone, windows open—you’re scaring me, honey.”
She sounded genuinely frightened. Nothing in her tone suggested danger. But Dad’s message kept echoing—the urgency, the specificity.
“Dad texted us,” I said carefully. “He said to leave the house and not trust you. We need to know why.”
