So, what do we do? We Marcus said, "Yes, we fight me." Marcus didn't fight her. Nothing. He said, "Marcus, tonight nothing.

Tomorrow I go to work. Friday, I write you a check for $26." Oh my god. $26. Claire Marcus, there is a man. I know there's a man, Marcus said.

There's always a man. Claire, you don't understand what I'm telling you. I'm not telling you to give up. I'm telling you what I've got. I've got a kid and a job and a truck note and a mortgage and one uncle who's dead and a sister indicator and about $1,100 and that's the whole army.

That's everything I can put in the field. So, we don't go at him tomorrow. We go at him when we can hit him. And until then, we do not give him one single thing to use. So, we do nothing.

We do nothing loud. Marcus said there's a difference. Deacon Hollis taught me that with a compressor in a truck bed. At 12:44, Clare said, "Marcus, can I ask you something?" You're going to anyway when you were on the porch with him.

She turned her head. You said doorbell cameras. The second thing I put in this house after my wife died. First was the deadbolt. Yeah.

Was that a lie, too? Marcus was quiet for a second. The deadbolt's real, he said. Why'd you put in a deadbolt? And Marcus Williams said something he had never said to his sister, his pastor, or himself.

Because for about 4 months after Nikki died, he said, "I couldn't sleep unless I knew the door was locked. And I'd get up two, three times a night and I'd check it. And I'd go back to bed and I'd lie there and I'd think, "Did I actually check it or did I dream that?" And I'd get up and check it again. Clare didn't move.

And one night, Lily came out at 2:00 in the morning and found her daddy standing in the dark holding a door handle. Marcus said, "5 years old." And she said, "Daddy, are you locking the door or are you leaving?" Oh my god. So, I put in a deadbolt with a thumb turn.

You can see from the hall, Marcus said. So she could look. So she could stand in her doorway and look down the hall and see it turned so she'd know. Clare had both hands over her face. I'm telling you this, Marcus said, because I want you to understand what I am.

I'm not brave. I'm a man who bought a lock he could see from the hallway. And you came to my door at 11:47 at night because you thought it was the safe house. and you were right. And it's the safe house because a 5-year-old asked me if I was leaving. At 12:51, Clare said into her hands, "Marcus, I unplugged my own refrigerator."

"What? That's what I told myself in March for 3 days." She lowered her hands. I want you to understand what he took. He didn't take a ring, Marcus.

He took the part of me that knows what's true. I couldn't trust my own hands. I stood in my kitchen and I did not know if my own hands had done a thing an hour before. Claire. And then tonight, she said, "You stood on a porch and told a man there was a camera and there is no camera and I watched him walk away not knowing what was real."

She looked at him. That's the first time, she said. In 11 months that it was on the other side. At 1:02 in the morning, Marcus's phone lit up on the arm of the couch. He looked at it.

He didn't pick it up. Marcus, it's Doug, your boss. It's 1:00 in the morning. Marcus, don't. He picked it up.

This is Marcus. He listened for 11 seconds. Then he said, "Yes, sir." Then he said, "No, sir, that's not." Then he said, "Doug, Doug, can I Doug?"

Then he said, "Yes, sir." And he hung up. Clare was on her feet. "Marcus." Marcus set the phone down on the arm of the couch very carefully like it might go off.

"Marcus, what complaint?" he said. "What complaint?" "Customer complaint." His voice had gone completely flat, which was the worst thing Clare had heard, yet worse than the driveway, worse than the porch.

Residents on Delano Street says the tech performed unauthorized work and misrepresented a warranty. Claire's hand went to her mouth. Ruthie Coleman's house, she said. Ruthie Coleman doesn't own that house. Marcus said, "That's the whole thing.

She doesn't own it. I've been going in a house for 4 years and doing free work in a building that as of April belongs to Marsh Development. And I told an 81-year-old woman a part was on warranty when it wasn't because I paid for it out of my own pocket." And Claire, that is a lie. in writing on a work order with my signature on it. That's not It's a false warranty claim on company paperwork.

Marcus said 11 times in 4 years. They can't. They can. Marcus said it's true. That's the beauty of it.

It's completely true. At 106, Clare said, "What did Doug say?" Suspended pending review. pending Monday. That's That's 4 days, Marcus said. That's 4 days to find out if I'm an HVAC tech or a man with an 8-year-old and $1,100.

He sat down on the couch and then he didn't sit. He sort of went down and he put his elbows on his knees. He didn't have to touch me, Marcus said. You understand? He didn't have to do one thing to me.

He just went and found the nicest thing I ever did and handed it to my boss. At 1111, Lily Williams's voice came down the hall. Daddy. Marcus' head came up so fast. Baby, go back to bed.

Daddy, why is Miss Clare crying? She's not crying, baby. Yes, I am. Clare said. Marcus looked at her.

Don't, Clare said. Don't tell her. It's fine. Marcus, don't. She already knew about Malik's dad.

At 1:13 in the morning, Marcus Williams sat on his couch and looked at his daughter standing in the hall in a night gown with a cartoon otter on it, holding the doorframe with both hands in the exact spot she had stood the night all of this started. Lily, he said, come here. She came. She sat on the couch between them, which neither of them had planned, and which neither of them ever forgot. Baby, Marcus said.

Daddy might not have his job for a little while. Clare made a small sound. Because of the police, Lily asked. No, because of Miss Clare. No, Marcus said.

Because of a man. Lily thought about that. Is he the one who broke Miss Clare's air? The room stopped. Clare's head came around so fast.

Lily, Marcus said very carefully. What did you say? The man who broke Miss Clare's air. Lily said like it was the dumbest question anyone had ever asked her. Lily, Marcus said, "How do you know somebody broke it?"

"Because I saw him." At 1:15 in the morning, nobody in that living room breathed. "Baby," Marcus said. "Look at daddy. When did you see him?"

"Wednesday." "Wednesday." When when I was getting my bike, Lily said, "From the side." You said, "Don't leave it in the front." So, I put it on the side by the fence and I went to get it and there was a man in Miss Cla's yard on a little ladder.

Lily, he had a hat. Lily, what time? I don't know. Was it light or dark? Light, Lily said.

It was still hot. It was before you got home. Clare had gone the color of paper. Lily, Marcus said, and he had to stop and start again. Baby, did he see you?

And Lily Williams said. He waved at me. Clare made a sound like something tearing. He waved at me, Lily said. And I waved back because you said, "Be polite to grown-ups on the street."

And he said, "Hi." And I said, "Hi." And then he asked me a question. Marcus could not speak. "What did he ask you?"

Clareire said. And Lily Williams, age 8, said he asked me if my daddy was home a lot. Marcus Williams did not raise his voice. That was the thing Clare would remember later when she went back over that night. The way you go back over a car accident.

He did not raise his voice. He did not stand up. He did not grab his daughter by the shoulders. He got down on the floor in front of the couch so that his eyes were lower than his kid's eyes. And he put his hands flat on his own knees where she could see them.