Chapter 3 - The Ransacked Sanctuary
Officer Reid requested that we step back inside so my parents could inventory the house and confirm if anything was missing. I followed them upstairs into my destroyed bedroom, staying near the doorway beside Officer Reid. My mother walked around the shredded mattress, refusing to look me in the eye. Jade stood near the closet, her arms crossed tightly over her chest, chewing on her thumbnail. "Nothing of value is gone," my father announced after a brief glance around the room. "It's just vandalism. Some local kids trying to scare people." "Local kids don't carry combat knives and leave targeted threat notes, Mr. Barnes," Officer Reid replied coldly. "We're treating this as a targeted felony home invasion and potential stalking case." While Reid spoke, my eyes wandered across my ruined bedroom floor. My books had been swept off the shelves, my desk drawers inverted. But as I looked toward my open closet, something caught my attention. In the far corner of the closet floor, where my old winter boots usually sat, two wooden floorboards had been pried up with a crowbar. I frowned, walking over to the closet. "Officer Reid," I called out. "What's this?" My mother let out a sharp, audible gasp. "Ivy, stay out of the closet!" she snapped, stepping forward quickly. "
It's just old flooring!" "No, it's not," I said, ignoring her and kneeling down. Beneath the pried-up floorboards sat a small, square metal cavity built directly into the subfloor. It was an old floor safe. I had lived in this bedroom for twelve years and had never known it existed. The safe door was wide open, completely empty except for a layer of gray dust. Officer Reid knelt beside me, shining his flashlight into the dark recess. "Did you know this safe was here, Miss Barnes?" "No," I whispered. "Never." Reid turned his head, fixing a sharp, analytical gaze on my father. "Mr. Barnes, is this your safe?" My father swallowed hard, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead. "It's... it's an old safe from the previous homeowners. It's been empty for decades. We forgot it was even there." "Then why did the intruder pry up those specific floorboards?" Reid asked, his voice smooth and dangerous. "They knew the exact location of a hidden safe under a rug, under a pile of shoes, inside a specific bedroom. That requires intimate knowledge of this house's structure." My mother's face was chalk-white now. She looked as though she might faint. As Officer Reid stood up to examine the edges of the safe, my hand brushed against the carpet beneath my dresser. My fingers hit a thin, folded piece of paper that must have slid under the furniture during the intruder's search. I quietly slid my hand beneath the dresser and palmed the paper, tucking it into my jacket pocket without anyone noticing. I didn't know what my family was hiding, but I knew with absolute certainty that I could no longer trust a single word that came out of their mouths.
