Chapter 9 - THE TRUTH ABOUT VANESSA
"You're in debt," I said to Vanessa. It wasn't a question.
She nodded slowly, tears rolling unchecked down her face. She sank onto the edge of the sofa, burying her face in her hands.
"My parents died," she said, her voice muffled. "They left me everything. And everything was gone. Loans. Debts. Legal fees. Marcus found me. He told me he was Elena's brother. He told me you had killed her and gotten away with it. He said all I had to do was marry you, gather evidence, and he would pay off every debt I owed. I thought… I thought I was helping a grieving relative get justice. I thought I would be free."
"And then you fell in love," Marcus sneered.
Vanessa flinched but did not look away from me.
"I didn't expect to like you," she said to me, ignoring him. "I didn't expect Olivia to be so smart, or Emma to be so sweet. I didn't expect this house to feel like a home. Or you… to be the kind of man Elena described in the letters Marcus showed me. Kind. Patient. Loving. That didn't fit the monster he told me about."
She wiped her face with trembling fingers.
"So I started questioning him. Asking for proof. And every time I asked… he threatened me. Told me I was already an accomplice. That if I backed out, he would tell everyone I had helped him plan Elena's murder. I was trapped, Adrian. Married to a man I was supposed to destroy… falling for him instead."
Her confession hung in the air, raw and honest.
I looked at her. At the red mark on her cheek. At the fear and guilt warring in her eyes. She had lied to me. She had married me under false pretenses. She had nearly dropped Emma to her death. But she hadn't wanted to. She had been manipulated. Trapped. Used.
Just as I had been.
I turned to Marcus. He stood near the door, watching us, his expression dark and calculating. He realized his control was slipping.
"This changes nothing," Marcus said sharply. "The facts remain. Elena died in that stairwell. Adrian was the last person to see her alive. There are questions. And I will keep asking them until I have what I want."
"Ask them," I said. "Because the truth is nothing like what you told Vanessa."
I walked over to the bookshelf, pulled aside a row of leather-bound volumes, and revealed the small wall safe hidden behind it. I spun the dial, the mechanism clicked, and I pulled the heavy door open.
May you like
From the very back, I withdrew the small metal box Vanessa had mentioned earlier. I set it on the table.
"Elena didn't run from me that night," I said quietly. "She ran to me."
