Chapter 2 - The Road Drew Could Barely RememberThe ambulance arrived four minutes later.
Peter remembered every second.
He remembered Lily refusing to release Drew’s sleeve while a paramedic wrapped her in a silver emergency blanket.
He remembered Drew trying not to scream when another paramedic examined his leg.
He remembered the boy repeatedly asking whether anyone was taking them back.
“No,” Peter told him each time. “Nobody is taking you anywhere without me.”
The officers searched Peter’s house first, then the yard and nearby street. There was no sign of Reena. No vehicle waiting nearby. No adult who had followed the children.
One patrol officer examined Drew’s damaged shoe.
“How far did you walk?”
Drew’s eyes fluttered.
“I don’t know.”
Peter knew the distance between Reena’s house and his.
Twelve miles by road.
Too far for a healthy six-year-old carrying a three-year-old.
The children could not have traveled the entire way on foot.
At the hospital, doctors separated them only long enough for emergency examinations.
Drew had a severe fracture below the knee, dehydration, bruising, and infected scrapes across both palms. Lily was dangerously dehydrated and underfed. The doctors found no immediately life-threatening injuries, but both children showed signs of prolonged neglect.
A nurse asked Peter whether he was their legal guardian.
“I’m their uncle.”
“Where is their mother?”
“Reena is their stepmother.”
“And their father?”
Peter looked through the treatment-room window.
Aaron had been dead for seven months.
A construction accident, according to the official report.
A fall from a commercial roof during an early-morning inspection.
Peter had attended the funeral standing beside Reena while she cried into a white handkerchief and accepted sympathy from everyone who believed she had lost the love of her life.
Afterward, Reena told Peter the children needed stability.
She reduced visits.
Canceled weekends.
Stopped answering calls.
Peter had believed grief made people withdraw.
Now he wondered what grief had allowed him not to see.
Detective Hannah Cole arrived before midnight. She had a calm voice and a notebook she rarely looked at while asking questions.
Drew was too exhausted for a full interview, but he remembered fragments.
A dark room.
A narrow window.
Concrete stairs.
Lily crying because there was no food.
Reena telling them they would stay downstairs until they learned gratitude.
Then Drew remembered waking after falling near the furnace.
His leg hurt too badly to stand.
But Lily had stopped crying.
That frightened him more than the pain.
He found an old screwdriver near a shelf and worked at the basement-window latch until his palms bled.
He pushed Lily through first.
Then dragged himself outside.
A delivery driver found them near a service road and asked whether they needed help. Drew became frightened when the man reached for his phone. Reena had told them police would separate them forever if they spoke.
So Drew lied.
He said their uncle lived nearby.
The driver gave them water and carried them several miles before Drew panicked and demanded to be let out.
From there, Drew recognized Peter’s neighborhood from an old car ride.
He carried Lily the rest of the way.
Peter sat outside the hospital room, staring at his hands.
He had believed the children were being protected from the chaos after Aaron’s death.
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Instead, they had been disappearing behind a locked door.
👉 Drew had escaped the basement through a window—but the reason Reena imprisoned the children began before Aaron died.
