Chapter 15 - Harper as Bait
Victor had never taken Harper.
Claire remained with her at the mansion.
But Mia didn’t know that.
Victor called her from a spoofed number shortly before she left the train station.
Phone-provider records confirmed contact.
Content was unavailable.
The rideshare audio filled enough.
“He has Harper.”
Mia believed it.
That explained why she voluntarily entered Victor’s car.
Then the trail vanished for six hours.
At 10:22 a.m., Victor appeared on a highway camera near Albany.
Alone.
No Mia visible.
He claimed later that Mia got out at a rest stop.
No camera supported it.
No witness remembered her.
Investigators treated it seriously.
I treated it personally.
That was dangerous.
My first instinct was to find Victor myself.
Roman stopped me.
“Boss.”
“Move.”
“No.”
Nobody said no to me like that.
He did.
“You go after him outside the legal process, and every defense lawyer gets exactly what they want.”
“You think I care about lawyers?”
“I think Mia does.”
That stopped me.
Mia had spent weeks collecting evidence.
Not revenge.
Evidence.
I stayed.
Victor was questioned through counsel.
He admitted picking Mia up.
His story:
She demanded to know where Harper was.
He told her Harper was safe.
She threatened to expose Northstar.
He offered money.
She refused.
At a rest stop, she left.
“Where?”
He provided coordinates.
Investigators searched.
No evidence.
Then Victor made a claim designed to hurt me.
“Mia planned to disappear.”
“Without Harper?”
“She believed you would eventually take Harper from her.”
That was possible.
Mia and I had argued about guardianship after Adrian died.
I had been controlling.
Protective, I called it.
Sometimes the difference was perspective.
Then her bank account revealed a withdrawal.
$25,000 cash.
Two days before she disappeared.
Her passport was missing.
Could she have planned an escape?
Yes.
Would she leave Harper?
Everything we knew said no.
Then Harper did something important during a child-development session.
The specialist did not interrogate her.
She simply played with dolls.
Harper placed a mother doll inside a toy car.
Then put a baby doll behind a toy door.
She repeated:
“Mommy come back.”
It wasn’t courtroom proof.
It was emotional consistency.
Mia intended to return.
Then investigators found Victor’s toll record.
After the alleged rest-stop drop-off, his car drove north.
Forty-seven miles farther.
Toward a private cabin owned by Northstar.
Victor had lied about where their drive ended.
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And the cabin’s electricity usage spiked for three days after Mia vanished.
📖 Victor claimed Mia walked away voluntarily, but the hidden cabin he drove toward stayed occupied for three days—and someone inside ordered medicine in Mia’s name. 👇
