Chapter 2
Beate had not called her father first.
That was the detail Thomas kept returning to, and it hurt more than he wanted to admit.
She had tried to handle it alone.
Not because she trusted Gero.
Because fear teaches people to shrink their emergencies until they sound manageable.
Her first message had arrived at 2:17 in the morning.
Dad, are you awake?
Thomas had been asleep for less than two hours. Retirement had not taught him how to sleep deeply. Thirty-four years in uniform had trained him to wake before danger finished knocking.
He called immediately.
Beate did not answer.
Then came another message.
Don’t call. He’ll hear.
Thomas sat up in bed so fast his dog tags swung against his chest.
What happened?
Three dots appeared.
Disappeared.
Appeared again.
I need to know if an old nursery camera can still save footage if the app is deleted.
Thomas stared at the words.
The old nursery camera had been his gift months earlier, when Beate and Gero moved near Fort Liberty for what Gero called a “fresh start.” Thomas had installed it himself. Not because he distrusted anyone then, but because soldiers do not apologize for backup systems.
He had connected it to Beate’s phone.
Then, privately, to a protected cloud archive in case the device failed.
He never told Gero about the backup.
He almost told Beate, but she had laughed that day and said, “Dad, you are the only grandfather who baby-proofs like a Pentagon contractor.”
So he let her tease him.
Now the question on his phone made his blood run cold.
He replied: Yes. Why?
This time, Beate sent nothing for four minutes.
Then a single sentence appeared.
I think it saw what he did.
Thomas called again.
No answer.
He got dressed while dialing Detective Brenner, a former military-police investigator he trusted more than most people with badges. By the time Beate finally answered, she was whispering so quietly he could barely hear her.
“Dad, I can’t go home again.”
He did not ask if she was exaggerating.
He did not ask what she had done to make Gero angry.
He said, “Where are you?”
Beate gave the name of the clinic.
May you like
Thomas was already moving toward the truck.
Read Chapter 3 👉 Because Thomas knew how to secure evidence, but nothing prepared him for seeing his daughter walk into the clinic protecting her belly from her own husband.
