The chilling footage played on a loop behind my eyes, even after Arthur had closed his laptop. My hands still trembled, the phantom weight of the USB stick burning into my palm. The shock of the explicit cruelty Dylan had displayed was a physical presence in the room.
I started to pace, the soft rug under my feet doing little to cushion the impact of my racing thoughts.
“I can’t believe it,” I muttered, shaking my head.
Arthur watched me, his expression a mixture of grim understanding and unwavering support. He knew me well enough to sense the storm brewing beneath my composure.
“Maeve, this changes everything,” he said, his voice quiet.
His words were an understatement. Everything I thought I knew about my family, about Dylan, had shattered. The image of the charming, devoted son, carefully cultivated for years, was a grotesque parody. It was a mask for a monster.
I stopped pacing abruptly, my gaze fixed on the empty spot where the footage had played. A wave of bitter realization washed over me. My earlier “coldness” towards Leo, as it might have appeared to others, now felt like a cruel irony. It wasn’t coldness towards Leo at all. It was a deep, unacknowledged fear.
A memory resurfaced: Leo, about a year ago, had tripped over a rug and scraped his knee. Dylan had been there.
“Oh, toughen up, champ,” Dylan had said, his tone dismissive, not concerned. “It’s just a little boo-boo.”
He had even chuckled softly, and I had simply dismissed it as typical older brother teasing. Now, that memory felt like a tiny, cruel barb, twisted by new knowledge. The way Dylan had casually belittled Leo’s pain, the lack of genuine sympathy—it was a pattern I had been too blind to see.
“I thought it was me,” I confessed, my voice raw.
I turned to Arthur, my shoulders slumping. “I thought my own trauma, my past… that I was somehow incapable of fully connecting with Dylan. That I was the flawed one.”
The truth was a heavy, suffocating blanket. My subconscious had been screaming at me, but I had rationalized it away. The gut feeling that something was off, that Dylan’s affection felt performative—I had blamed myself. The misunderstanding of my own feelings was now painfully clear.
“He always had an answer,” I continued, my voice gaining a desperate edge. “Always a reason. Leo was clumsy. Leo was prone to accidents. I believed him.”
Arthur just listened, letting me unravel. The shame was suffocating. I, Maeve Holloway, celebrated singer and actress, had been completely duped by a wolf in sheep’s clothing. My fame, my supposed wisdom, had counted for nothing against his calculated manipulation.
“We can’t just go to the police with this, Maeve,” Arthur finally said, breaking the silence.
I snapped my head up, my jaw tight. “Why not? It’s irrefutable proof!”
“Because of who Dylan is, publicly,” Arthur explained patiently. “And because it implicates you in a way. You allowed this to happen in your home. You need an airtight case. We need to understand *why* he’s doing this. This isn’t just random abuse.”
His words, though logical, felt like a slap. He was right. Dylan wasn’t some random aggressor; he was my “son.” The media would have a field day, twisting the narrative until I was the villain, a neglectful mother who let her adopted son harm her biological child. The thought made me sick.
“What do you mean, ‘why’?” I asked, a fresh wave of dread washing over me.
“People don’t just kick children for no reason, Maeve. Especially not someone as calculated as Dylan. There’s a motive here. A long game.”
His words echoed a chilling thought that had begun to form in the back of my mind. Dylan’s indifference, his coldness, felt too practiced. Too complete. It hinted at something deeper than just malice.
“You need to be prepared,” Arthur warned, his gaze steady.
“Prepared for what?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.
“For whatever dark secret this unearths. About Dylan, and possibly about your own past. These kinds of deceptions rarely exist in a vacuum.”
His observation hit a nerve. My past was a tangled mess of secrets and trauma, a childhood I rarely spoke of. The idea that Dylan’s cruelty could somehow be intertwined with those old wounds sent a fresh shiver down my spine.
“Where do we even start?” I asked, feeling overwhelmed.
“We start with Dylan,” Arthur replied, his voice firm. “His background. Everything you know, and everything you don’t. We need to build a full profile. And we need to get ahead of the media storm.”
He picked up the USB stick again, slipping it into a secure, padded case. My mind raced with possibilities, each more terrifying than the last. Who was Dylan, really? Where had he come from? The adoption had always been vague, a blur of paperwork and well-meaning intentions after my miscarriage.
I closed my eyes, picturing Leo’s face, pale and vulnerable in the hospital bed. The image fueled a renewed fire in me. I would protect him. I would uncover every single truth, no matter how painful, no matter what it cost me. This was no longer just about suspicion; it was about justice. My son deserved nothing less.
“Alright,” I said, my voice now firm, resolute.
“What’s the first step, Arthur?”
He looked at me, a flicker of approval in his eyes. “We need to speak to Eric. He was involved in the adoption, correct?”
“Yes,” I confirmed, my ex-husband’s name feeling like a distant echo from a life I barely recognized.
“He needs to see this footage. And he needs to tell us everything he knows about Dylan’s adoption. Every single detail.”
A cold dread settled in my stomach. Confronting Eric would reopen old wounds, wounds I thought had healed. But it was a necessary step. The truth about Dylan, about Leo’s abuse, demanded it. This reckoning was long overdue, and I would face it head-on.
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