Chapter 12 Jade
JADE
The door closes behind Ethan and Mateo, leaving an uneasy silence in the kitchen.
Gloria studies her tablet with forced concentration.
Sophie fidgets with her bracelets, the metallic jingle unnaturally loud in the quiet room.
Declan has positioned himself near the window, scanning the property line, his body a study in contained readiness.
And I sit here, trying not to unravel.
"More coffee?" Sophie asks, her voice too bright, too brittle.
"No, thank you." I'm too nervous as it is.
I need my hands busy, need to do something besides think about perimeter breaches and security alerts.
I reach for the stack of mail Gloria brought in earlier, organizing it into neat piles: bills, magazines, business correspondence.
The familiar task anchors me, gives me something concrete to focus on while my mind refuses to stop conjuring worst-case scenarios.
"I'm sure it's nothing," Gloria says, not looking up from her tablet. "Probably just a false alarm."
"Probably," I agree, though neither of us believes it.
Declan says nothing, his silence more honest than our forced optimism.
I sort through the mail: a glossy magazine, a bill from my accountant, a letter from my favorite charity. Then my fingers find a large manila envelope with no return address, just my name typed on a plain white label. Something about it sends a whisper of unease down my spine.
"What's that?" Gloria asks, noticing my hesitation.
"Not sure." I slide my finger under the sealed flap, tearing it open. "Probably more contract paperwork for..."
The words die in my throat as I pull out the contents. Photos. Not professional shots or magazine clippings, but grainy surveillance-style images. Of me. In my living room. On my sofa. At my desk.
Yesterday.
Me in my threadbare hoodie, hair piled messily on top of my head, curled up with a book. Me working at my computer, completely unaware of being watched. Me standing by the window, phone to my ear.
Each photo is marked with a timestamp. Yesterday afternoon. Yesterday evening.
My hands begin to tremble.
"Jade?" Gloria's voice seems to come from far away. "What is it?"
I can't speak, can't form words. I just push the stack of photos toward her, my fingers gone numb with shock.
Gloria's sharp intake of breath draws Declan's attention. He crosses the room, eyes narrowing as he looks over Gloria's shoulder at the images.
"When were these taken?" he asks, voice deadly quiet.
"Yesterday," I whisper. "In the living room. I was alone... I thought I was alone."
Declan takes out his phone, already moving. "Stay here. Don't touch anything else." Into the phone: "Ethan, get back to the house. Now! We have a situation."
Gloria flips through the photos with increasing horror. "How is this possible? How did someone get these?"
"Not sure yet," Declan says, his gaze sweeping the room with new intensity.
"There's something else," Sophie says, carefully extracting a small white card that had fallen from the envelope onto the table. She holds it gingerly by the corners, eyes widening as she reads.
"What does it say?" I ask, though part of me already knows, already feels the sick dread pooling in my stomach.
Sophie swallows hard. "'Hello, Little Doll. Did you miss me? I've missed you. It's been lonely without you.'"
The room tilts sideways. Black spots dance at the edges of my vision. Little Doll. The name Charles used to whisper while his hands moved where they shouldn't, while I froze in confused terror, too young to understand what was happening but old enough to know it was wrong.
But Charles is dead. He is as dead as one can be. Closing my eyes, I can still recall the relief I felt when I realized he could never hurt me again.
So who...
The front door slams open, and Ethan and Mateo rush in, weapons drawn. They take in the scene in an instant: the photos spread across the table, my ashen face, Declan's protective stance.
"What happened?" Ethan demands, holstering his gun when he sees there's no immediate threat.
"Someone's been watching Jade," Declan explains, gesturing to the photos. "Inside the house. Yesterday."
Mateo picks up one of the images, examining it closely. His eyes narrow, and he pulls out a small penlight from his pocket, studying the corners of the photo.
"These are still frames," he says, voice hard. "Not photographs. Pulled from video footage."
"A hidden camera?" Ethan asks sharply.
"Has to be," Mateo confirms. "The quality, the angle, it's consistent in all of these. Fixed position, probably very small."
Ethan looks at Mateo, who is already pulling equipment from his pockets. A small handheld scanner and what looks like a modified smartphone. "On it."
He moves methodically around the kitchen, then leads the way to the living room. We follow in tense silence, watching as he sweeps the device in slow arcs.
"Our security system monitors for electronic intrusions, unauthorized access, perimeter breaches," he explains as he works.
"But some of the newest micro cameras are completely passive until activated remotely.
They don't emit continuous signals, don't connect to networks unless commanded to, which makes them nearly impossible to detect with standard sweeps. "
His scanner suddenly emits a soft beep. Mateo freezes, eyes locked on the device. Then he moves with deliberate precision toward the sound system beneath the bookshelves, near the east windows, the same vantage point from which all the photos were taken.
"There," he says quietly, pointing to a slim component on the stereo. "Don't touch it."
Ethan steps closer, examining it carefully. It's a sleek, modern device, something nobody would notice among the stereo components.
Mateo carefully tilts his scanner toward it. "It's a micro camera."
"How did it get here?" Gloria asks, her voice shaking slightly.
"Someone brought it in," Ethan says simply. "Someone who had access to the house."
The implication hangs heavy in the air. Someone got past not just the exterior security, but into the house itself. Placed an object in plain sight, knowing we'd all walk past it daily without noticing.
"But the system..." I begin.
"It could have been here prior to the installation of the security system and only activated remotely yesterday," Mateo says, his expression grim. "Or brought in by someone who entered with an authorized visitor."
My mind spins with a myriad of possibilities.
"How do we handle this?" Declan asks, interrupting my spiral of suspicion.
"With caution," Ethan replies. "Mateo, can you disable it without destroying potential evidence?"
"Already on it." Mateo pulls more equipment from his seemingly bottomless pockets and sets to work with delicate precision.
"The good news is that this isn't connected to our security network at all.
It's a completely standalone device. Whoever placed it had to have physical access, but they didn't compromise our system. "
The knot in my chest loosens marginally. At least the fortress they've built around me isn't completely breached.
"Got it," Mateo says, carefully extracting a tiny black object no bigger than a button from inside the stereo unit. "Camera disabled. I'll need to take it apart in a controlled environment to retrieve the data, see if we can trace the transmission signals."
"We should call the police," Gloria suggests, already reaching for her phone.
"Not yet," Ethan counters. "We need to complete our sweep first, make sure there aren't more devices. Mateo can pull data that might lead us to whoever did this, data the police might miss or destroy through standard evidence procedures."
"Or that might vanish when the person responsible realizes we've found the camera," Declan adds darkly.
"More importantly," I say, finding strength in the middle of this nightmare, "we need to decide our next move."
Everyone turns to look at me.
"What do you mean?" Gloria asks carefully.
"This person, whoever they are, they've been watching me. Learning my routines, my habits." I gesture to the envelope of photos. "And now they've decided to let me know I'm being watched. Why? Why now?"
"The timing suggests it has something to do with your return to public life," Ethan theorizes. "The photoshoot tomorrow..."
"Exactly," I interrupt. "They've been content to observe from a distance, but now that I'm about to leave the house, reenter the world..."
"They're escalating," Declan finishes, understanding my train of thought.
"We cancel everything," Gloria says firmly. "The shoot, the interviews, all of it. Until this person is caught."
"No," I counter, a strange calm settling over me. "That's exactly what they want. For me to be scared, to hide away, to feel powerless."
"Jade," Gloria begins, "this isn't about being brave. This is about being safe."
"I'm not safe anywhere," I gesture to the tiny camera in Mateo's palm. "They've already been here, already watching. Running won't stop this."
"What are you suggesting?" Ethan asks, studying me intently.
"We move forward with the shoot, the interviews, all of it," I say. "But we do it knowing the stakes. Knowing this is real. I don't want to play games. I want to take back control of my life."
A heavy silence falls over the room. The easy camaraderie of our breakfast seems like it happened in another lifetime, not mere minutes ago. The professional boundaries have snapped back into place, clear and defined.
Yet there's something else there too. A recognition, a respect I didn't see in the early days.
"Then we double the protocols," Ethan says slowly. "From now on, you don't breathe without backup. No exceptions."
"Agreed," I say.
"We lock it down," Ethan says firmly. "No outside personnel. Just us. No unnecessary outings. We tighten coverage, double our shifts, and sweep the entire property every day until we're sure this place is clean."
"Whatever it takes," I nod.
Ethan and Declan exchange a look, some unspoken communication passing between them.
"Mateo, complete the sweep," Ethan orders. "Every room, every possible hiding place. I want to know if there are more devices, and I want to know now. From now on, we have daily sweeps."
"Already on it," Mateo confirms, packing up the disabled camera with careful precision.
As they all move with focused urgency, I remain standing in my living room, staring at the spot where the camera had been hidden. Recording me. Watching me. Invading the sanctuary of my home with the same violation I thought I'd escaped at sixteen.
But this time is different. This time, I'm not a confused, frightened child. This time, I have resources, allies, strength that my fourteen-year-old self couldn't have imagined.
This time, I'm fighting back.
I look at the envelope of surveillance photos, these images meant to terrify me into submission. Instead, they've awakened something I thought had been buried years ago. A fierce, burning determination that carried me through the darkest days of my youth.
Whoever is doing this, whatever sick game they're playing, they've made a fatal miscalculation. They think they're hunting the girl I was.
They have no idea who I've become.