My Eight Brothers Gave Me a Scary Toy as a Joke… Wait, It Actually Saved Me Chapter 02
I picked up the backup meds and ran through the rain to my studio in west Bellhaven.
Three years of scholarships and side jobs had paid for it.
Less than three hundred square feet. But it was the only place where I could breathe.
That was where I researched how fear works in children.
How to help them face it on their own terms, safely, in a space they controlled.
understood that feeling better than anyone.
The racing heart. The cold hands. The way your throat closes
before your brain even catches up.
Years later, your body still remembers before you do. It runs before you think.
That’s why I wanted to build a toy,
Something that could hold a scared kid steady and bring the fear down.
But when I got there, the lock had been forced.
The room was a complete mess.
Someone had torn the computer tower apart. Half the
sample cabinet was cleaned out.
The flowcharts on the wall were ripped down. Even the
backup hard drive was gone.
I stood in the wreckage, paper everywhere, my hands shaking
too hard to hold my phone.
The next day, Sloane held a small product launch.
She announced a new therapeutic toy line for children.
It was called “Cuddle Critters.”
One look at the livestream and I recognized it.
The toy that synced its lights to a child’s breathing rate. The
one that auto–muted when a child cried too hard.
It was a prototype from my “Little Steps to Brave” collection.
It still had the internal testing interface I hadn’t gotten around to stripping out.
Sloane stood onstage in a white dress, her voice dripping warmth.
I just want every scared little kid out there to feel like someone’s got them.”
The audience erupted.
Graham watched from the front row like she was blood. Like
she was the family’s best and brightest.
I turned off the livestream and immediately headed to Prescott Group.
Years of my life were in that design.
I had to get the hard drive back.
But the security guards stopped me as soon as I reached the lobby.
All eight of them stepped out of a private elevator.
Not one of them asked if I was okay. Not one asked where I’d slept.
The first thing out of Graham’s mouth was, “April Fools‘ is
over. You can come home now.”
Grant sneered. “You deaf? Go home.”
I stared at them, and for a second the whole scene felt like
something happening to someone else.
Sloane walked out from behind them, her eyes red.
Come home, Tessa. No one’s mad.”
I looked right through her. “Give me back the hard drive.”
Reid didn’t even blink. “What hard drive? I checked the server
logs. You shared those files with Sloane yourself.”
“Stop pretending. No one took your things.”
My jaw locked. I could barely get the words out.
“You tampered with the logs.”
His gaze turned cold.
“Where’s your proof?”
It always came down to proof.
Every time they hurt me, they wanted receipts.
But all Sloane ever had to do was cry, and they believed every word.
I knew I would never get the hard drive back, so I turned to leave.
Grant caught my arm and hauled me toward the car.
I fought him, but it was like pulling against a wall.
The jack–in–the–box spoke from inside my bag.
(Don’t yank your arm. Your wrist will snap.]
(Don’t panic. Just go with them for now.]