Chapter 4 - The Gathering of the Wolves
The next morning,
I met with my lawyer at a small café on the outskirts of town.
The thumb drive sat on the table between us,
a silent witness to the destruction of my family.
My lawyer,
a sharp-eyed man named David,
watched the footage in grim silence.
“This is gold,
Matt,”
he said,
closing the laptop with a snap.
“Between the medical reports and this video,
Meredith will never get unsupervised visits again.”
“But we need to identify the man in the video,”
he added,
pointing to the frozen frame of the stranger.
I spent the day digging through our bank records and phone bills,
searching for any clue.
I found nothing,
no strange charges,
no unknown numbers,
only the calculated silence of a woman who knew how to hide.
In the afternoon,
I received a call from Eleanor,
demanding a meeting at the house to "discuss a settlement."
I didn't want to go,
but David advised me that it was a chance to see their hand.
I left Lily with a trusted friend and drove to the house,
my heart a cold stone in my chest.
When I walked in,
Meredith and Eleanor were sitting at the dining table,
looking like they were preparing for a tea party.
Meredith had a bandage on her wrist,
a pathetic attempt to look like the victim.
“Matthew,
we're willing to overlook your erratic behavior at the hospital,”
Eleanor began,
her voice dripping with condescension.
“If you drop the charges and agree to joint custody,
we won't sue you for defamation.”
I looked at them,
at the sheer audacity of their entitlement.
“I have the video,
Eleanor,”
I said,
placing the thumb drive on the table.
Meredith’s face went pale,
her hand trembling as she reached for her water.
“Evelyn Parker has a camera,”
I continued,
enjoying the way the air seemed to leave the room.
“I saw Wednesday night,
Meredith.”
“I saw you hunt our daughter like an animal in this very room.”
“And I saw the man you were with.”
Eleanor didn't miss a beat,
her eyes narrowing as she looked at her daughter.
“It was a mistake,
a moment of weakness,”
Eleanor barked,
trying to regain control.
“It doesn't change the fact that a child belongs with her mother.”
“The man was just a friend,
someone helping Meredith through her depression.”
I laughed,
a harsh,
hollow sound that echoed through the house.
“A friend who watches a child get beaten?”
I asked,
leaning over the table.
“A friend who hides in the shadows while a little girl screams for her father?”
I told them I was going to the police that evening,
and that their "settlement" was a joke.
Meredith started to cry,
not out of remorse,
but out of fear for her own skin.
She begged me to think of Lily,
to think of how a trial would affect her.
“I am thinking of Lily,”
I said,
standing up to leave.
“That's why I'm making sure she's never near either of you again.”
As I walked toward the door,
the phone in my pocket buzzed.
It was a text from the friend watching Lily,
saying that she was finally talking.
Saying that she was ready to tell me about the "other person" who had been there.
I left the house,
May you like
ignoring the screams of my wife and the curses of my mother-in-law.
The final piece of the puzzle was about to fall into place.
