Chapter 4 - The Camera on the Garage
My parents had three exterior cameras.
Front door.
Garage.
Driveway.
Dad installed them after someone stole a package.
He forgot the driveway camera pointed directly toward the flower bed where he picked up the brick.
Detective Ellison watched footage outside my room first.
Then asked:
“Do you want to see it?”
“No.”
Ethan did.
His face changed before thirty seconds passed.
“What?”
He looked at the detective.
“She handed it to him.”
My uncovered eye moved toward him.
“Who?”
“Your mother.”
The footage began fourteen minutes before Ethan and I arrived.
Catherine walked into frame.
She carried something wrapped in a dish towel.
Placed it behind the brick border beside driveway.
Then Richard came outside.
They spoke.
No audio from camera.
Catherine pointed toward the hidden object.
Richard uncovered it.
Brick.
He held.
Put down.
Then picked it up again when our car turned onto street.
That meant he did not grab the nearest object in rage.
Mom placed the weapon.
For him.
Then Chloe appeared in doorway.
She watched.
Never left.
When I stepped from car, Richard approached.
I smiled.
I remembered that.
I was smiling.
Then one swing.
No argument.
No push first.
Brick directly into my face.
Ethan ran.
Catherine stayed on porch.
Chloe stepped out.
Then Mom laughed.
The front door camera had audio.
“Let’s see if he still wants to marry you now.”
Captured.
Chloe:
“I told you she was never going to give him up willingly.”
Captured.
Richard:
“You’re marrying the wrong daughter.”
Captured.
Then the electrician.
Neighbors.
Every cruel sentence preserved.
Detective Ellison said:
“This supports planning.”
I stared at ceiling.
“Planning to kill me?”
“We don’t know intent yet.”
Good answer.
Brick to head can kill.
But proving intent depends evidence.
Then police searched the Vance house under warrant after Richard’s arrest and Catherine’s detention.
Chloe initially not arrested.
She claimed she did not know violence would occur.
Detectives would investigate.
Richard was booked on serious assault charges pending prosecutor review.
Catherine too later as potential accomplice depending evidence.
Then the brick.
Fingerprints.
Richard’s obvious.
Catherine’s too.
Because she carried it.
Blood.
Mine.
Then dish towel.
Found in kitchen trash.
Dust matching brick.
Planning.
Then their phones.
Warrants took time.
Meanwhile I remained hospitalized.
My eye.
Doctors could not promise full vision.
The orbital fracture was repaired.
Retina bruised.
Optic nerve swollen but intact.
“Will I see?”
The ophthalmologist said:
“We need time.”
I hated time.
Wedding was five months away.
That should not have mattered.
It did.
Not because beauty.
Because I had spent eighteen months planning a day with Ethan.
Now every mirror felt like another person’s decision stamped across my face.
Then Ethan sat beside me.
“I don’t care what happens to your face.”
Wrong sentence.
He realized immediately.
“I mean…”
“I know what you mean.”
“I love you.”
“I know.”
“Then why are you angry?”
“Because everybody keeps telling me what should matter.”
He stopped.
Good.
“I care what happens to my face.”
“Yes.”
“I care whether I can see.”
“Yes.”
“I care that our wedding photographs were part of what they attacked.”
“Yes.”
“I care that my mother wanted me to feel undesirable.”
His eyes filled.
“Yes.”
“Do not tell me it doesn’t matter.”
He took my hand only after I held mine out.
“It matters because it matters to you.”
Better.
Then a nurse entered with another sealed evidence envelope.
Not police.
Hospital security had received personal property from my clothing.
My purse.
Inside was a folded note.
I had never seen.
Someone had slipped it into my bag at my parents’ house before the attack.
The handwriting belonged to Chloe.
Emma, if Dad gets angry, do not stand near the driveway.
My pulse stopped.
May you like
Chloe had known something.
Continue to the next part: Chloe’s warning proves she expected danger before Emma arrived, and investigators now have to determine whether she tried to protect Emma or simply protect herself from what her parents had planned.
