The dining room remained frozen in a tableau of shock. The spilled wine dripped off the table onto the rug. Drip. Drip.
Helen had her head in her hands, sobbing. "My baby... look at her arm..."
Brady slammed his fist onto the table. The silverware jumped.
"She's lying!" he yelled. "She has to be! She did it to herself to manipulate us! She's a psycho!"
"Brady," Jethro warned, but his voice lacked conviction.
"No, Dad! Think about it! Who comes back and flashes scars like that? She wants money. She wants pity."
Kaleigh reached out and touched Brady's arm. "Brady is right, Mom. People with... unstable minds... they self-harm. It's a cry for help."
Ambrose had been standing by the sideboard, silent. He stepped into the light.
"That wasn't self-harm," he said. His voice was cold steel.
Brady whipped around. "Whose side are you on?"
"I'm on the side of facts," Ambrose said. He walked over to the table. "I served in the military, Brady. I know what self-inflicted wounds look like. The angle is wrong. The depth is wrong."
He looked at the empty chair where Clarisa had sat.
"Those burns on the back of her arm? You can't reach that angle with a cigarette in your own hand unless you're a contortionist. Someone else did that to her."
The room went deadly quiet again. Ambrose's words carried the weight of authority. He didn't lie about violence.
Brady slumped back in his chair, running a hand through his hair. "Fuck."
Kaleigh's eyes darted between Ambrose and her parents. She saw the shift. The doubt.
She stood up, wiping her tears. "Then we need to get her help. Real help. I know a doctor... Dr. Evans. He's a psychiatrist. He can evaluate her."
"Yes," Helen said, grasping at the straw. "A doctor. We'll get the best doctor."
Kaleigh hid a smile. Dr. Evans was on her payroll.
Back in the Lotus Lodge, Clarisa sat on the floor in the dark.
She hadn't turned on the lights. She was applying an antiseptic cream she had stolen from the bathroom cabinet to her burns.
She knew what had just happened. She had dropped a bomb. Now she had to wait for the fallout.
She took her leather-bound notebook and carefully worked at the inside of the back cover with her thumbnail. A thin panel of reinforced cardboard came loose, revealing a hidden compartment. Tucked inside was not a phone, but something just as vital: a wafer-thin, single-use satellite phone, barely thicker than a credit card. A parting gift from Gilda, the hacker who had ruled the camp's electronics shop.
She powered it on. The screen glowed blue in the darkness.
She typed a text to a number she had memorized.
I'm in. Phase one complete. They are shaken.
She waited. Three seconds later, the reply came.
Copy that. Files are ready to upload. Just say the word. - G
Clarisa smiled. Gilda owed her a life. This was how she was repaying the debt.
Clarisa typed back: Hold. Let them simmer.
She powered down the device and sealed it back inside the notebook's cover.
She lay back on the hard floor. For the first time in three years, she didn't feel like a victim. She felt like a hunter.
