Chapter 6 - BUNNY WAS NOT THE ONLY TRACKER
Investigators searched our belongings with my consent.
One additional tracker was found beneath a removable panel in Hadley’s old backpack.
Another had been attached under our minivan months earlier and was gone by the time I left because Trent kept the vehicle.
The girls had been trackable before I ran.
That was the important part.
This was not a panicked husband improvising after his wife disappeared.
He had prepared.
Ruthie’s rabbit had location history extending back nearly five months.
“Why track your own children at home?” I asked Alicia.
“Ask what happened five months ago.”
I checked dates.
Five months earlier, I had quietly visited a job fair.
Trent found out.
We fought.
He told me:
“If you’re planning something stupid, remember the girls stay with me.”
I thought he meant divorce.
Maybe he did.
Three days later, he resewed Bunny’s ear after it “tore.”
I had forgotten the timing.
Then his work records created another problem.
Trent’s HVAC company served hundreds of homes and businesses around Dayton.
He had used the customer database to search addresses connected to people in my contacts.
Erica’s old apartment.
Nicole’s mother.
The church where my mother used to volunteer.
A women’s resource center I had called once but never visited.
His employer suspended him while it investigated unauthorized access.
He blamed me.
Through his attorney.
I had cost him his job.
That became his new story.
Then Dana explained digital safety to me.
New phone.
New email.
No shared cloud account.
Location services reviewed.
Children’s devices checked.
School pickup passwords changed.
Medical-office privacy flags.
It felt absurdly complicated.
Leaving one man required redesigning my entire information system.
Then Hadley asked:
“Can Daddy see our new house on the phone?”
“We don’t have a new house yet.”
“When we do.”
“No.”
“You promise?”
I almost said yes.
Instead:
“We’re making it very hard for him to know things we don't tell him.”
Dana had taught me that.
Do not promise perfect safety.
Promise process.
That evening, Gary’s name appeared on my new phone.
Alicia had asked whether I wanted her to contact him.
I said yes.
Now he was calling.
I stared until voicemail picked up.
A message appeared.
I did not listen.
Not yet.
Then another notification.
Gary had emailed Alicia several years of messages between himself and Trent.
Subject line:
May you like
FOR SHELBY WHEN SHE IS READY.
My father had kept records too.
