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Sayer frowns.

"There were pictures."

"I know."

"I remember them."

His voice grows smaller.

"I thought maybe..."

"No."

"You didn't imagine them."

Someone deliberately removed every image of Sayer's earliest years. Not all the photographs. Just those. As if they wanted to erase the beginning of his story.

Rhett opens the bedroom door. The room is exactly what you'd expect for a 15-year-old boy. Books stacked beside the bed. A guitar leaning against the wall. Homework scattered across a desk.

Nothing disturbed. Nothing stolen. Except…

Rhett kneels beside the desk chair.

"What?"

He points to the hardwood floor. Faint grooves. Parallel. Like heavy furniture had been dragged across it. Only…

There isn't any missing furniture.

I crouch beside him.

"What made those?"

"Whatever’s doing all this."

He shines the flashlight toward the wall. The grooves stop. Abruptly. As though whatever created them simply…

Vanished.

Sayer stares silently at the marks.

"I've never seen those before."

I believe him. Because I don't think they were there before. Outside, thunder rumbles across the October sky. The room grows noticeably darker. Rhett slowly stands.

"We've seen enough."

"Already?"

He nods.

"This wasn't a kidnapping."

"What do you think it was?"

His eyes move across the room one final time. Then settle on mine.

"I think someone—or something—didn't want to leave evidence."