The man—Patterson? Maybe?—leads off. “It’s an ugly thing, what I’m about to tell you,” he warns. “After searching Mr. Alistair’s computer at his law firm, we have a pretty clear image of his state of mind.”

“What does that mean?” Colt asks.

“It means we found thousands of images and videos recorded over the course of several years.” His eyes drift my way. “Of you, Miss Peters.”

“Me?”

“You were a gymnast, were you not?” I nod, mute with surprise. “It seems Mr. Alistair had what can only be described as an obsession. He took videos of you during competitions and oftentimes zoomed in on specific body parts.” He clears his throat, his face darkening a little as he looks at his partner.

“The dates on the files stretch back four years to when you were fourteen years old,” she explains in a gentle voice. “I’m sure this must come as quite a shock, especially seeing as how he was your stepfather for a short time.”

“Mr. Alistair,” Patterson continues, looking at Colt. “Did you know about any of this? Did you ever have any idea of your father’s feelings toward your stepsister?”

He doesn’t hesitate. “Yes. I did. My brother and I both did. He moved us here so he could be closer to Leni. I knew about it even before we moved. It was the reason he…” His face crumples a little like there’s something he has to say, but he doesn’t know how to say it. “It was the reason he tried to kill our mother.”

I can’t wrap my head around it. I hear what he’s saying, but it makes no sense. Like he’s speaking another language.

“Would you care to elaborate on that?” Jones asks, and now I see she’s taking notes.

“I guess he first saw Leni during a competition. My mom, she was a coach. Leni was one of the gymnasts on another team. And I don’t know. He was obsessed with her. He started taking random business trips, just out of nowhere, last minute. We found out later he was actually traveling to the places where Leni was competing.”

All I can do is dig my nails into my palms as I absorb this. All that time.

“That was what first clued my mom into what was going on,” Colt mumbles. “He was supposed to be at a conference or something, then she found out there was no such conference going on, so she started digging into his travel arrangements and stuff. And then, I guess she found some of his pictures, something. And when she confronted him with it… we thought he killed her, my brother and me. He told us she was in a coma after he took her to the hospital.”