Chapter 3 - Shadows at the Door
The rain had turned into a steady, freezing drizzle by the time Uncle David drove me back to my small suburban home. The streetlights flickered against the wet pavement, casting long, eerie shadows across the front lawn.
"You're staying with me and your Aunt Sarah tonight," David said, keeping the car idling in the driveway. "You can't be in this house alone, Lia. Not after what happened today."
"I need to pack some of Emma’s things," I replied quietly, looking up at the dark, silent windows of the place where my daughter had spent her short life. "And I need her medical logs. I kept every receipt, every notebook, every daily chart since the day she entered the trial."
David sighed, looking at me with deep concern. "I’ll come inside with you."
"Give me ten minutes alone, David. Please. I just need to breathe in her room for a minute."
He hesitated, then slowly shifted the car into park. "Ten minutes. I'm waiting right here on the porch."
I stepped out into the damp cold, unlocking the front door. The house smelled like fresh paint and lavender—the lavender soap I had used to wash Emma’s bedsheets the morning before she went into the hospital. The silence inside was absolute, heavy with the phantom sounds of running footsteps and laughter that would never echo through these hallways again.
I walked down the narrow corridor to Emma’s bedroom. The door was half-open. On her small wooden desk sat her watercolor set, the brushes still resting in a dried jar of blue-tinted water.
I sat down on the edge of her bed, holding Mr. Hoppy close. I let out a ragged breath, letting the first real tears slip down my cheeks in the dark.
"I'm going to fix this, sweetie," I whispered into the quiet room. "I promise you. I'm going to make them pay."
A sharp click sounded from the hallway.
My head snapped up. The sound hadn't come from the front door where David was waiting. It came from the back kitchen door.
I froze, holding my breath.
Footsteps—soft, deliberate, rubber-soled footsteps—were moving across the linoleum floor of the kitchen toward the hallway.
"David?" I called out, trying to keep my voice steady.
No answer.
I quietly stood up from the bed, grabbing a heavy brass desk lamp from Emma’s nightstand. I backed into the corner of the room, behind the open door, holding the heavy lamp with both hands.
The footsteps paused outside Emma’s bedroom. A tall, broad shadow stretched across the carpeted floor.
A man in a dark rain jacket and a baseball cap pulled low over his face stepped silently into the room. In his gloved hand, he held a sleek, dark hard drive duplicator and a small crowbar. He immediately walked toward Emma's desk, opening the bottom drawers where I kept her medical binders.
He was searching for the trial records.
"Looking for these?" I said from the shadows.
The man whirled around instantly, his hand reaching inside his jacket. But before he could draw whatever was hidden there, I swung the brass lamp with every ounce of strength in my body.
The heavy base hit him square across the cheekbone.
He groaned, staggering backward against the closet door, dropping his crowbar with a loud clatter. I didn't stop. I charged forward, shoving him hard into the hall wall.
"David! Help!" I screamed at the top of my lungs.
The intruder cursed, striking out with his forearm, catching me across the collarbone and throwing me onto the floor. But before he could step over me, the front door burst open.
"Lia!" David’s voice roared from the living room.
The attacker realized he was out of time. He lunged over my legs, ran down the hallway toward the kitchen, threw open the back door, and disappeared into the pouring rain and the darkness of the backyard.
David came rushing around the corner, holding an iron fireplace poker, his face pale with panic. "Lia! Are you alright? What happened?"
I sat up on the floor, gasping for air, rubbing my shoulder. "Someone was in the house. He was looking for Emma's trial notes."
David rushed over to help me up. He looked at the thrown drawers, the dropped crowbar, and then down at the floor near the closet door.
"He left something," David said, pointing.
Beside the closet lay a small, laminated security badge that must have slipped out of the man’s jacket pocket when I hit him with the lamp.
David picked it up with a tissue.
The badge featured a high-resolution photo of a man named Vance Miller, along with a clear corporate title: Aegis Bio Corp – Asset Protection & Security Division.
"They’re already cleaning house," David whispered, looking at the badge. "They realized Callista was arrested, and they sent a team to destroy any secondary evidence you had."
I looked down at the badge, then back at Emma’s watercolor painting on the desk. The fear that had gripped my chest moments ago vanished entirely, replaced by a cold, burning clarity.
"They made a mistake," I said, reaching into my purse and pulling out my phone.
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"What mistake?" David asked.
"They think they are fighting a legal battle," I replied, taking a picture of the security badge. "They don't realize I'm not going to sue them. I'm going to tear their entire company down to the ground."
