Chapter 4 - THE WOMAN WHO WAS SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD Lake Geneva was hidden beneath a gray sky when the investigators arrived.
The abandoned estate looked empty from the outside.
Inside, they found Maya Torres.
Alive.
Weak.
Terrified.
She looked at Victor first.
Then Lily.
“You stayed,” Maya whispered.
Lily knelt beside her.
“What happened?”
Maya told them everything.
Months earlier, she had discovered abnormal sedatives in Ethan's blood.
When she confronted Serena, she was accused of stealing jewelry.
Then she disappeared.
She had been moved between several properties.
Serena wanted to know what she had told Lily.
The investigators searched the building.
Then they found the photograph.
Isabella Blackwood.
Alive.
Standing outside a private clinic in Switzerland.
Victor stared at it.
His voice was almost inaudible.
“She died.”
Marco swallowed.
“I verified the body.”
Victor looked at him.
“Did you see her?”
“No.”
One word.
It destroyed him.
The investigation uncovered another secret.
Serena was Isabella's half-sister.
For years, Serena had watched Isabella receive everything she believed should have belonged to her.
The family name.
The education.
The respect.
Victor.
But jealousy had only been the beginning.
Serena had systematically erased Isabella.
She had convinced doctors that Isabella was unstable.
She had arranged for her to be confined.
She had manipulated records.
And when Isabella tried to escape, Serena created the boating accident.
The world was told Isabella had died.
But she hadn't.
A recovered recording proved it.
“I woke up in a clinic.”
“She told me Victor wanted me declared unstable.”
“She said Ethan was safer without me.”
Victor covered his face.
Lily watched him.
For the first time, the terrifying man everyone feared looked completely lost.
Then investigators discovered that Isabella had entered the United States three weeks earlier.
Destination:
Chicago.
Victor stood.
“She’s here.”
Then Lily noticed another drawing pinned beneath a desk.
The same house.
The same baby.
The same words.
THE MOTHER COMES HOME AFTER THE WEDDING.
Serena had never intended to let Isabella stay dead forever.
She intended to bring her back after the wedding.
After Victor had given Serena legal authority.
After Ethan had been removed.
After Isabella's identity had been destroyed.
She wanted the dead woman to return only when her return would no longer matter.
Victor stared through the window.
For the first time in years, he understood something terrifying.
May you like
The person he had spent years mourning was alive.
And the person he planned to marry had been the architect of her disappearance.
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