Chapter 3 - THE EYES WATCHING FROM NOWHERE
My heart hammered against my ribs as I stared at the screen. The photo was clear. Someone had stood right there, on the other side of the gate, and watched us leave.
"Who is it?" Mia asked softly.
I turned the phone away.
"A wrong number. Nothing important."
I lied to keep her calm. But my mind raced. Who had sent it? Vanessa? Or did she have help?
I swept the street with my eyes. Empty. Quiet. No one in sight. But the photographer had been close. Too close.
I grabbed our bags, took Mia's hand, and hurried her to the car. I locked the doors the moment we were inside. I drove away without looking back, my eyes darting constantly to the rearview mirror.
No one followed. But the feeling of being watched did not fade.
We arrived at a small, quiet house Grace had once owned at the edge of the city. A place I had almost forgotten. Grace had kept it for emergencies, she had once said. I understood now why.
It was modest compared to our home. Warm walls, soft carpets, a garden full of flowers. Mia walked slowly from room to room, touching things gently.
"Is this where we live now?"
"For a little while," I said. "Just until we are safe."
That evening I sat at the kitchen table with the memory card and the letter. I went through every file again. Names. Dates. Places.
Elena Morrison—Vanessa—had lived three lives. She had changed her name twice. She had worked in three different cities. Everywhere she went, people trusted her. And everywhere she went, something was stolen. Reputations. Money. Happiness.
Grace had been right. She was a predator. And she had set her sights on us a very long time ago.
I found a list of names. People Elena had worked with. People she had hurt. One name appeared repeatedly: Julian Vance. He had been with her in every city. In every scheme.
I took out my phone and called the one person I knew I could trust—my oldest friend, Marcus. He was a lawyer. And he had known Grace since we were children.
He answered on the second ring.
"Adrian?"
"I need you to come over. And bring everything you can find about a woman named Elena Morrison. Also known as Vanessa."
Marcus did not ask questions. He simply said, "I will be there in thirty minutes."
He arrived sooner. He walked in, took one look at my face, and sat down. I told him everything. The scissors. The camera. The letter. The memory card. The photo.
Marcus listened in silence. When I finished he leaned back, his face grave.
"Grace came to me two years ago," he said quietly. "She made me promise that if anything happened to her, I would watch over you and Mia. She said she was afraid of someone she had once known. She never gave me a name."
My breath caught.
"She told you?"
"She said Elena was patient. That she would wait until there was no one left to protect you. And then she would strike." Marcus tapped the files on the table. "This Julian Vance. He is dangerous. He and Elena have been partners for years. If she is here, he may be too."
I thought of the photo. The timing. The silence that followed.
"She is not working alone," I said.
"No. And she knows where you are."
That night I moved Mia's bed into the room I would sleep in. I locked every window. Every door. I sat in the chair beside her bed while she slept, watching the shadows.
Around midnight my phone buzzed again.
Another message.
This time no photo. Just words.
*You think a letter can stop me? I know what Grace did. And soon everyone will know too.*
I replied immediately.
*What did she do? Tell me.*
The reply came seconds later.
*Come find me. And I will tell you every dirty little secret your perfect wife took to her grave.*
I stared at the words until they blurred.
What secret could Grace have kept? What could possibly justify what Vanessa had done?
I opened Grace's letter again.
*She knows secrets about me too. Things I told her when we were young and foolish. She will use them to hurt you.*
Grace had warned me. She had known Vanessa would try to poison my memory of her.
But I would not let her. I would not let her rewrite history. I would not let Mia grow up doubting the mother who had loved her more than anything.
I stood up and walked to the window. The night was dark. But somewhere out there, Vanessa was waiting. Watching. Planning.
And I realized something that made my blood run cold.
She had not come just to hurt me. She had not come just to take what she felt she was owed.
She had come to destroy Grace's memory.
And she would use Mia to do it.
I turned back to the bed. Mia slept peacefully, her breathing soft and even. The ribbon Vanessa had pulled too tight was gone. But the mark remained.
I would not let Vanessa win. Whatever secret she claimed to hold, whatever lie she intended to tell, I would face it. For Grace. For Mia.
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But as I looked at my phone one last time, a terrible thought took root in my mind.
What if the secret was not a lie?
