She pushed the stroller down the stairs… but forgot the camera was watching.

Smoke billowed upward into the night sky.

I lay on the ground outside the burning cabin, hands tied behind my back, watching the flames devour the roof. Beside me, Elara wept silently, her face streaked with soot and tears. Vivian and the lawyer stood by their car, arguing loudly, the engine idling.

Then movement stirred on the porch.

Jared.

He dragged himself forward, leaving a trail of blood, but he was alive. And in his hand, he held his phone. Recording.

“I got it,” he whispered, voice barely audible. “Everything they said. Every confession. The lawyer admitted to poisoning your father. Vivian admitted everything about the stroller… about setting the fire… about taking Ethan.”

Hope flared painfully in my chest.

“Keep it safe,” I whispered back. “Hide it. If we die… it survives.”

Jared nodded and slipped the phone beneath a heavy stone, half-buried in the earth, just as the lawyer turned and saw him.

The lawyer raised his gun.

“No!” Elara screamed, throwing herself between them. “You have done enough!”

Vivian grabbed her and shoved her back down. “Silence! Tie them together! We drive now!”

They bound Jared beside us, rough and cruel. Vivian climbed into the back seat with Ethan. The lawyer took the wheel. As we were forced into the trunk of the second car, I caught one last glimpse of the stone beneath which the phone lay hidden.

Hidden. But not lost.

And Vivian… Vivian had made her final mistake. She had been so certain she had won, so triumphant in her moment of glory… that she had confessed everything while Jared recorded every word.