And I calmly pulled out my phone and sighed.

“Pardon me.

Medication reminder.” Brenda relaxed.

She had no idea that Sam was sitting two tables behind us with a directional microphone, recording every arrogant word the two of them had just spoken into the record.

Chapter 11 — Fifty-Two Seconds

The evidence kept coming, because a family that had grown that careless in its cruelty had left tracks everywhere.

Mason showed up at my cousin’s house one evening, believing Gaby was hiding there alone, and boasted through the intercom that he could make land records disappear, that he worked with legal deeds every day, that if we cooperated he could make all our trouble go away — while Dan, standing beside me, recorded every word.

But the piece that changed everything came the next morning, when Tyler called me in a panic.