The policy had been fast-tracked through a boutique firm in Seattle. But it was the “additional documentation” that made my stomach turn. It was a psychological evaluation form, forged on the letterhead of a local psychiatrist, stating that I—Gideon Hartley—suffered from “severe, untreated clinical depression and suicidal ideation.”
She wasn’t just planning to frame me for abuse. She was planning to kill me and make it look like a suicide driven by the shame of my “crimes.”
I felt like I was standing in a room with a ticking bomb. I called the insurance company’s fraud department, my voice a clinical monotone. I flagged the policy. I flagged the forgery.
But then, the final escalation occurred.
At 3:00 AM the following night, I shot out of bed. It wasn’t the sound of crying this time. It was a smell.
Acrid. Chemical. Hot.
The garage was on fire.
I grabbed Lumi from her bed, wrapping her in a blanket, and sprinted out the front door just as the smoke began to billow from the vents. The fire department arrived within ten minutes, but as I stood on the sidewalk, clutching a trembling Lumi, I saw Maris pull into the driveway.
She fell out of her car, her face a mask of devastated, hysterical grief. “Oh my god! Gideon! Lumi! Are you okay?”
She hugged us, her tears feeling like acid on my skin.
Captain Rodriguez, the fire marshal on duty, pulled me aside an hour later. “Mr. Hartley, we found traces of accelerant—specifically paint thinner—poured in a pattern around the interior door leading into the house. This wasn’t a short circuit. Someone wanted this fire to spread fast.”
Maris was right behind me, her voice a trembling sob. “Who would do this? Why would someone target our family?”
I looked at my wife. I looked at the woman who had likely poured that thinner herself, planning to be the “sole survivor” and grieving widow once the insurance check cleared.
“I don’t know, Maris,” I said, my eyes boring into hers. “But I’m sure the police will find out.”
I didn’t wait for her to respond. I called Jake. “I’m bringing Lumi to the ranch. I don’t care what Maris says. She stays there until this is over.”
As I drove Lumi away from the smoking ruins of Birch Street, she whispered from the passenger seat. “Mommy said she’d light the fire if I told secrets. She said the fire would eat the bad people.”
“The fire didn’t eat us, Lumi,” I said, my hand gripping the wheel until it hurt. “And it’s never going to touch you again.”
The war was no longer silent. It was a blaze, and I was going to make sure Maris was the one who got burned.
Chapter 6: The Trap is Set
With Lumi safely sequestered at my brother’s ranch under the watchful eye of a private security detail Finn had arranged, I returned to the Birch Street house. It was a charred monument to a lie.
Finn met me in the driveway, his face a grim mask. “The fire marshal found her fingerprints on the empty paint thinner can in the basement, Gid. But it’s not enough. She’ll claim she was just cleaning or organizing. We need to catch her in the act of the next phase.”
“She thinks I’m still her puppet,” I said. “She thinks the insurance policy is still active. She’s going to make her move soon.”
We set the trap.
Finn created a digital persona—a “fixer” named Travis Roy—and made sure the contact information was “accidentally” left open on my laptop while Maris was in the room. We waited.
The bait was taken within four hours.
