Chapter 6: Dr. David Reynolds
The detective stared at the silver key tag for several long seconds before slipping it carefully into the evidence bag.
Every officer in the room seemed to recognize the name.
I didn't.
"Who is Dr. David Reynolds?" I asked.
The detective looked at me, then at Lily, who refused to let go of my hand.
"This isn't the place."
"It is now."
His jaw tightened.
"You've already been dragged into something much bigger than a family dispute."
He motioned for another officer to escort the remaining guests outside before speaking again.
"David Reynolds has been under federal investigation for nearly eight years."
My father frowned.
"For what?"
"We never had enough evidence to charge him."
The detective paused.
"Until tonight."
Outside, the cheerful backyard looked like a crime scene.
Police cruisers lined the street.
Ambulances treated the wounded officer.
Yellow crime scene tape surrounded the farmhouse.
Neighbors gathered across the road, whispering as reporters began arriving.
The birthday balloons still floated above the tables.
Only now they looked strangely out of place.
Lily sat wrapped in a blanket inside an ambulance.
A pediatric nurse carefully examined the bruises on her wrists and arms.
She was quiet.
Too quiet.
Every few minutes, she'd glance toward the farmhouse, as if expecting someone to emerge from the shadows.
I sat beside her.
"You don't have to be brave anymore."
She looked at me.
"I wasn't brave."
"I was scared."
My throat tightened.
"Being scared doesn't mean you aren't brave."
She leaned against me.
"I knew you'd come."
Those six words nearly broke me.
The detective introduced himself.
"My name is Detective Aaron Hayes."
He opened a folder inside the mobile command vehicle.
Photographs covered the pages.
Some showed abandoned buildings.
Others showed missing children.
Several faces had red X's drawn across them.
"Over the past decade," Hayes said, "children disappeared in six different states."
"Some came home."
"Many didn't."
My father slowly lowered himself into a chair.
"What does that have to do with Reynolds?"
Hayes slid another photograph across the table.
It showed a younger David Reynolds standing beside a charity banner.
He wore a tailored suit, smiled confidently, and had one arm around the shoulders of several children.
"He founded a nonprofit organization called The Sparrow Foundation."
I froze.
"Sparrow..."
The word echoed in my mind.
I reached into the equipment bag recovered from the basement.
The black binder.
Project Sparrow.
The names matched.
Hayes carefully opened the binder.
His eyes widened with every page.
"This..."
He whispered.
"This is the first internal document we've ever recovered."
The room fell silent.
He turned another page.
Then another.
Finally, he stopped.
"No..."
"What?" I asked.
He looked directly at me.
"This wasn't a kidnapping operation."
"It was a recruitment program."
I stared at him.
"For what?"
He didn't answer immediately.
Instead, he handed me the binder.
Near the center was a page labeled:
Phase Two Selection Criteria
Beneath it:
"Children displaying exceptional emotional dependence are ideal candidates for long-term conditioning."
Another line chilled me even more.
"Parents with unusually strong protective instincts reduce long-term success rates."
My own evaluation appeared again.
Candidate Rejected.
Reason:
"Father unlikely to surrender emotional bond."
My father whispered,
"They studied you..."
"...before Lily even existed."
Hayes nodded grimly.
"That's exactly what worries me."
An evidence technician entered the command vehicle carrying one of the hard drives rescued from the fire.
"We recovered partial surveillance footage."
Hayes connected it to a laptop.
A grainy video appeared.
Timestamp:
Three Weeks Earlier.
The camera overlooked the underground playroom.
Lily sat coloring at the small wooden table.
She wasn't alone.
Another little girl sat beside her.
Maybe five years old.
Brown hair.
Pink sweater.
Neither child spoke.
Then the door opened.
Tessa entered carrying juice boxes.
She smiled warmly.
Nothing about her expression resembled the woman I'd confronted in the backyard.
She knelt beside both girls.
"You've both been very good today."
The second child asked quietly,
"When can I go home?"
Tessa gently stroked her hair.
"Soon."
"You just need one more lesson."
The video continued.
Daniel entered next.
He handed Tessa a folder.
She glanced inside.
Her smile disappeared.
"He rejected another family."
Daniel sighed.
"He always does when the father gets too attached."
They were talking about me.
Hayes immediately paused the footage.
"This is enough to charge both of them."
I wasn't listening anymore.
I couldn't stop looking at the little girl beside Lily.
"Who is she?"
The detective searched his database.
After several moments, a file appeared.
His face fell.
"Her name is Ava Collins."
"She disappeared eleven months ago."
The command vehicle became completely silent.
"Missing?" my father asked.
Hayes nodded.
"She's never been found."
I looked back at the paused image.
The footage proved she'd been alive only three weeks ago.
Which meant someone had moved her.
Recently.
Very recently.
An officer rushed into the vehicle.
"Detective!"
"We found two vehicles leaving the orchard."
"One belongs to Daniel Carter."
"The other is registered to David Reynolds."
"Direction?"
"Northbound."
Hayes immediately stood.
"Alert every highway patrol unit."
As officers rushed to their radios, another technician entered carrying a recovered cell phone from the basement.
"It's damaged."
"But we recovered one unsent message."
Hayes opened it.
The message had been typed by Daniel only minutes before we broke into the hidden corridor.
She's remembering more than expected.
If Lily talks, she'll lead them to Ava.
We're moving tonight.
Every person in the command vehicle stopped breathing.
Ava wasn't dead.
She was still alive.
Somewhere.
And whoever had taken Daniel and Tessa...
Was already trying to disappear with her.
Hayes snapped the folder shut.
He looked directly at me.
"We're no longer investigating a kidnapping."
"We're racing to save a child before she vanishes forever."
Outside, police sirens roared to life as dozens of patrol cars sped into the night.
Miles away, two fugitives were running.
And somewhere ahead of them...
May you like
A little girl was still waiting for someone to come find her.
End of Chapter 6
