Page 149 of I Replaced His Husband
My throat was dry as I opened the complete file from the garden camera recorded at the time when I had heard some rustling noises I’d dismissed as auditory hallucinations.
With trembling hands, I played the video and… froze.
My heart almost stopped!
A figure was approaching the building, dressed entirely in black, even his face was wrapped in black.
My heart raced, feeling like it would burst out of my chest. I wiped the sweat from my forehead, my breath catching in my throat.
I switched to the view from the entrance camera.
Whoever it was, he used the password, he knew the access code to Marco's house! I cursed under my breath, a string of foul words escaping. The intruder did something more; I saw him bending over the panel, fiddling with it. Was he erasing logs? If so, how, without knowing the master code? Or did he know it?
The camera's range was limited, but one showed part of the living room. I saw the dark silhouette moving toward the stairs.
My throat constricted painfully, as I nervously fast-forwarded the recording. Whoever entered spent exactly twenty-seven minutes inside. What was he doing during that time?
My hands were sweaty, new droplets constantly forming on my forehead and temples. How could I have been so stupid to think we weresafe?
But when that thought crossed my mind, another replaced it. I somehowknew, I was sure, that this person was also the shooter who killed our attackers. How? I couldn't explain it, but I justknew.
Assuming that was the case, why would he want to harm us now? If not, why is he here?
I quickly reviewed the other recordings. This man had been coming to our house since the day of the birth, regularly every three or sometimes five days, always spending about half an hour inside, sometimes even 40 minutes.
Fed up with nervously staring at the dark silhouette roaming the house, I quickly logged out, closed all the windows on the screen, and left Marco's office, biting my lip almost to the point of bleeding.
What should I do?
For half an hour I was a fucking mess, unable to focus, but I knew I had to calm down before Kay saw me. For now, he was asleep, as was Ray.
So I went outside, hoping the fresh air would ease some of my stress, and called Adam, pleading with him to come over because I had something urgent to take care of in the city.
Adam tried to ask what it was about, but I just barked at him to hurry up. He arrived twenty minutes later, and I was glad Kay hadn't woken up yet because I knew I wouldn't be able to explain why I felt so anxious. He would surely sense it through our Bond.
Adam's eyes widened when he saw me.
"Gosh, Rain, what's going on? Why the rush? Did something happen? You look like you've seen a ghost!"
"Something like that," I muttered under my breath, but quickly added, "It's nothing, just a little surprise I need to handle for Kay. Don't tell him anything. I'll be back in about an hour."
Adam nodded hesitantly, and went into the house, and I quickly drove to the city, to the headquarters of the company that installed our cameras and additional sensors. Fortunately, they were still open, so I went in and asked to meet with the manager. I had a brief conversation with the man, during which I asked how to add more cameras to the system. He was kind enough to provide the information and even offered me a discount on additional cameras. I bought them without hesitation. Armed with the knowledge of how to integrate them into the system, I headed back home.
Still uneasy, I used the drive back to take deep breaths and get over my nerves so that Kay wouldn't ask me any questions. I even stopped by the shore to work on my state of mind, trying to rationalize everything for Kay's sake. My mate was still in a sensitive period, just one month after giving birth. With almost superhuman effort, I finally managed to calm down, relaxing and pushing all my fears and strange thoughts into one corner of my mind, hoping Kay wouldn't notice.
When I got back, Kay greeted me with some surprise in his eyes, as we usually went shopping together. I explained that I had a flat tire and got a bit irritated with the whole situation. He looked at me carefully but said nothing.
Now, I just needed to find the right moment to install the cameras. As the evening was closing in, I finally chose to do it while he was in the bathroom bathing Ray.
Nervously glancing toward the room entrance, I installed a camera by the hinge of one of the side cabinets. The distinct wood grain pattern provided an excellent disguise. The camera was really small but required power, so I quickly drilled throughthe polish and ran a cable inside, hiding the battery behind a shoebox.
The whole surveillance system operated on Wi-Fi, sending its recordings to the central unit. I placed another camera in the hallway, near a decorative lamp, which provided good cover. The view showed part of the living room and the perspective of the door leading to Marco's office. Now, I just had to wait, hoping to catch this guy in the act.
Using the knowledge the manager from the camera company had shared, I created an additional folder named 'deleted'. For disguise, I filled it with 100 files that were just copies of original recordings with old dates. I set the path for the two new cameras to save their recordings to this folder, with read-only access for a single additional user named 'test user'. This way, no one else, not knowing the password, could access the files. For extra security, I also set them as hidden system files.
The next night, I struggled to fall asleep, but I woke up at the crack of dawn and rushed to Marco's office to check the recordings. But that night had been quiet; no one had shown up.
I had to be patient.
