Chapter 9 - They found an old VHS player in the storage unit.Nobody spoke while the tape loaded.
The screen flickered.
Static.
Then Mark appeared.
He looked younger.
Maybe ten years younger.
Behind him was the same bathroom.
Not our bathroom.
Another one.
Sophie wasn't there.
Neither was I.
A young woman sat on the floor.
Rachel.
She was crying.
Mark stood behind the camera.
“You said you wanted to know where your daughter was.”
Rachel looked up.
“Yes.”
“She isn't with me anymore.”
“Then where is she?”
Mark smiled.
“Safe.”
Rachel screamed at him.
“Give her back!”
The recording stopped.
Then another clip began.
This time Mark was alone.
He sat in a chair.
“This tape is for the mother,” he said.
“For the woman who thinks she married me.”
I felt my body go cold.
Mark looked directly into the camera.
“You're going to think I'm the villain.”
He paused.
“You're going to think I took Sophie.”
Another pause.
“I didn't.”
Officer Harris leaned forward.
Mark continued.
“I moved her because the people who wanted her were already watching.”
The screen cut to static.
Then another scene.
Me.
Pregnant.
Walking into a hospital.
I stared at the television.
“I don't remember that camera.”
Mark's voice continued.
“You were never supposed to know.”
The clip showed my father.
He was standing in a hospital hallway.
Beside him was Ethan Cole.
I gripped the chair.
My father had lied to me.
For years.
The tape continued.
“I needed you to marry me because no one questions a family when the paperwork looks clean.”
My stomach twisted.
But then Mark said something I wasn't prepared for.
“I didn't choose Sophie.”
I stared at the screen.
“She was already chosen.”
The tape jumped.
A document appeared.
My father's signature.
Rachel's signature.
Mark's signature.
And beneath them a line marked:
PROJECT S-05.
I couldn't breathe.
“What is Project S-05?” I whispered.
No one answered.
The tape jumped again.
This time Sophie was a baby.
Mark was carrying her.
But behind him stood Ethan.
Alive.
And much younger than in the photograph.
Ethan handed Mark an envelope.
Mark opened it.
His face changed.
Then the footage ended.
The final frame showed a handwritten message.
HER MOTHER DOESN'T KNOW.
I looked at Rachel.
She was crying silently.
“Your father knew,” she whispered.
“I know.”
“No.”
She shook her head.
“You don't.”
“What?”
Rachel stared at me.
“Your father wasn't protecting Sophie.”
She pointed to the screen.
“He was paying for her.”
The room went silent.
I felt something inside me collapse.
My father hadn't hidden my daughter from danger.
He had hidden the reason she was valuable.
Then Officer Harris's phone rang.
He answered.
Listened.
His face went pale.
Then he looked at me.
“They found Mark.”
“Where?”
He swallowed.
“At the cemetery.”
“Why?”
“He was waiting beside your father's grave.”
I stood.
“Is Ethan with him?”
The detective shook his head.
“No.”
“He left something there.”
“What?”
“A photograph.”
He put it in front of me.
It showed Sophie.
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On the back were six words:
YOU WERE NEVER THE REAL TARGET.
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