Chapter 8 - The Ghost of the Past
The windshield wipers of Clara’s beat-up station wagon screeched rhythmically against the glass, barely clearing the downpour. Clara drove with white-knuckled intensity, checking her rearview mirror every ten seconds.
Sarah sat in the passenger seat, shivering violently under a threadbare wool blanket Clara had handed her. On Sarah’s lap, the screen of her phone showed the upload progress bar crawling at agonizingly slow speeds: 34% uploaded to secondary drive.
"I told you, didn't I?" Clara said, her voice bitter and worn down by years of grief. "Three years ago at your engagement party, I pulled you into the kitchen. I told you Evelyn Vance was a monster who devours her sons' lives. You thought I was just a bitter ex-wife trying to ruin your happiness."
"I was stupid," Sarah whispered, tears pooling in her red-rimmed eyes. "Ethan was so sweet, so gentle. I thought you were exaggerating."
"Ethan is an extension of her ego," Clara scoffed, turning down an unpaved country lane bordered by thick pine trees. "She groomed him to be dependent on her validation. When I had my son, Lucas, eight years ago, Evelyn did the exact same thing. She started mixing crushed tranquilizers into his baby purees."
Sarah gasped, turning toward her. "What happened to Lucas?"
Clara’s face tightened, a deep, unresolved agony settling in the lines around her mouth. "I didn't have a hidden camera, Sarah. I had nothing. She called the police on me, said I was suffering from severe psychosis. Arthur Vance tied me up in court until I ran out of money. They took Lucas. They moved him three states away. By the time I proved I was sane, Lucas had been conditioned to believe I abandoned him. He doesn't even call me mom."
"I won't let her have Lily," Sarah said fiercely, her hand clenching into a fist. "I have the footage. She choked my baby, Clara. She poisoned her to frame me."
"Then she knows she's fighting for her life," Clara warned, pulling the car into the overgrown driveway of a secluded cabin hidden in the woods. "If that video gets out, Evelyn doesn't just lose custody; she goes to prison for attempted murder. She will spend every cent she has to wipe you off the face of the earth."
Clara killed the engine. The silence of the forest was deafening.
"We go inside, we finish the backup, and then we drive directly to the state attorney general's office," Clara instructed. "Local police are in Arthur Vance’s pocket. We bypass them completely."
Sarah nodded, clutching the phone. The upload bar hit 78%.
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As they stepped onto the wooden porch of the cabin, the headlights of an idling black SUV snapped on at the end of the dirt driveway, trapping them in a blinding cone of white light.
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